TLJ  D/~*\I  l/^LJ 
nKLJUon 

STAINED 


A  NOVEL 


GEORGE AGNEW 
CHAMBERLAIN 


THROUGH 
STAINED  GLASS 


THROUGH 
STAINED  GLASS 


A  NOVEL 


BY 

GEORGE  AGNEW  CHAMBERLAIN 

Author  of  "Home" 


NEW  YORK 
THE  CENTURY  CO. 

1915 


Copyright,  1915,  by 
GEORGE  AGNEW  CHAMBERLAIN 


Published  March,  1916 


THROUGH 
STAINED  GLASS 


2128712 


CHAPTEE   I 

IN  1866  the  American  minister  at  Kio  de  Janeiro 
turned  from  the  reality  of  a  few  incongruous  and 
trouble-breeding  Kentucky  colonels,  slouched-hatted  and 
frock-coated,  wandering  through  the  unfamiliar  streets 
of  the  great  South  American  capital,  and  saw  a  night- 
mare. There  is  a  touch  of  panic  in  the  despatch  which 
he  sent  to  Mr.  Seward  at  a  time  when  both  secretary 
and  public  were  held  too  closely  in  the  throes  of  recon- 
struction to  take  alarm  at  so  distant  a  chimera.  Agents 
of  the  Southern  States,  wrote  the  minister,  claimed  that 
not  thousands  of  families,  but  a  hundred  thousand  fam- 
ilies, would  come  to  Brazil. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  exodus,  when  it  took  place, 
was  so  small  that  it  failed  to  raise  a  ripple  on  the  social 
pool  of  the  Western  Hemisphere.  But  to  the  self -chosen 
few  who  suffered  shipwreck  and  privation,  financial  loss 
from  their  already  depleted  store,  disaster  to  their  Uto- 
pian dreams,  and  a  great  void  in  their  hearts  where 

3 


4        THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

once  had  been  love  of  country,  it  became  a  tragedy — 
the  tragedy  of  existence. 

The  ardor  that  led  a  small  band  of  irreconcilables  to 
gather  their  households  and  their  household  goods  about 
them  and  flee  from  a  personal  oppression,  as  had  their 
ancestors  before  them,  was  destined  to  be  short  lived. 
From  the  first,  fate  frowned  upon  their  enterprise. 
They  looked  for  calm  seas  and  favorable  winds,  but 
they  found  storms  and  shipwreck.  Their  scanty  re- 
sources were  calculated  to  meet  the  needs  of  only  the 
crudest  life,  but  upon  the  threshold  of  their  goal  they 
fell  into  the  red-tape  trammels  of  a  civilization  older 
than  their  own.  Where  they  looked  for  a  free  country, 
a  wilderness  flowing  with  milk  and  honey,  which  in  their 
ignorance  they  imagined  unpeopled,  they  found  the 
squatter  had  been  intrenched  since  the  Jesuit  fathers 
and  their  following  explored  the  continent  four  centu- 
ries before.  Finally,  they  believed  themselves  to  be  the 
vanguard  of  a  horde,  but,  once  in  the  breach,  they  found 
there  was  no  following  host. 

Most  of  those  who  had  the  means  reversed  their  flight. 
Others,  with  nothing  left  but  their  broken  pride,  sought 
aid  from  the  government  they  abhorred,  and  were  given 
a  free  passage  back  in  returning  men-of-war.  But  when 
the  reflux  had  waned  and  died,  there  was  still  a  residue 
of  half  a  hundred  families,  most  of  whom  were  so  des- 
titute that  they  could  not  reach  the  coast.  With  them 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS        5 

stayed  a  very  few  who  were  held  by  their  premature 
investments  or  by  a  deeper  loyalty  or  a  greater  pride. 
Among  the  latter  was  the  head  of  the  divided  house  of 
Leighton. 

The  Reverend  Orme  Leighton  was  one  of  those  to 
whom  the  war  had  brought  a  double  portion  of  bitter- 
ness, for  the  Leightons  of  Leighton,  Virginia,  had 
fought  not  alone  against  the  North,  but  against  the 
North  and  the  Leightons  of  Leighton,  Massachusetts. 

To  the  Reverend  Orme  Leighton,  a  schism  in  the 
church  would  have  meant  nothing  unless  it  came  to  the 
point  of  cracking  heads ;  but  a  schism  in  governmental 
policy,  which  placed  the  right  to  govern  one's  self  and 
own  black  chattel  in  the  balance,  found  him  taking  sides 
from  the  first,  thundering  out  from  the  pulpit,  sup- 
ported by  text  and  verse,  the  divine  right  of  personal 
dominion  by  purchase,  and  in  superb  contradiction  voic- 
ing the  constitutional  right  to  self-government.  When 
the  day  of  words  was  past,  he  did  not  wait  for  the  des- 
perate cry  of  the  South  in  her  later  need.  Abandoning 
gown  and  pulpit  for  charger  and  saber,  he  was  of  the 
first  to  rally,  of  the  last  to  muster  out.  Nor  at  the  end 
of  the  long  struggle  did  he  find  solace  in  the  knowledge 
that  he  had  fought  a  good  fight.  To  him  more  than  the 
South  had  fallen.  God  had  withheld  his  hand  from  the 
just  cause,  and  Leighton  had  fought  against  Leighton! 

It  was  characteristic  of  the  Reverend  Orme  Leighton 


6        THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

that  the  rancor  which  came  with  defeat  was  not  visited 
upon  those  members  of  his  clan  who  had  fought  against 
him.  But  for  that  very  reason  it  was  all  the  more  poig- 
nantly directed  against  that  vague  entity,  the  North. 
Never,  while  life  lasted,  would  he  bow  to  the  dominion 
of  a  tyranny,  much  more,  of  a  tyranny  which,  by  divid- 
ing the  Leightons,  had  in  a  measure  forced  neutrality 
upon  the  gods. 

Leighton  House,  Virginia,  found  a  ready  and  fitting 
purchaser  in  one  of  the  Leightons  of  Massachusetts. 
With  the  funds  thus  provided,  the  Eeverend  Orme 
Leighton  moved,  lock,  stock,  and  barrel,  six  thousand 
miles  to  the  south.  He  settled  at  San  Paulo,  where  he 
bought  for  a  song  a  considerable  property  on  the  out- 
skirts of  the  city.  He  rented,  besides,  a  large  building 
in  the  center  of  the  town,  and  established  therein  the 
Leighton  Academy.  Here  he  labored  single  handed 
until  his  worth  as  an  instructor  became  known;  then 
the  sudden  prosperity  of  the  venture  drove  him  to  en- 
gage an  ever-increasing  staff.  The  academy  developed 
rapidly  into  a  recognized  local  institution.  The  first 
material  revenue  from  the  successful  school  was  applied 
to  building  a  fitting  home  on  the  property  bought  for  a 
song. 

The  character  of  this  new  Leighton  House,  which  was 
never  known  as  Leighton  House,  but  acquired  the  name 
of  Consolation  Cottage  by  analogy  with  the  Street  of  the 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS         7 

Consolation  near  which  it  stood,  was  as  different  as 
could  well  be  both  from  the  prevailing  local  style  of 
architecture  and  from  the  stately  colonial  type  dear  to 
the  heart  of  every  Virginian.  The  building  was  long 
and  low,  with  sloping  roofs  of  flat  French  tiles.  A  broad 
veranda  bordered  it  on  three  sides.  The  symmetry  of 
the  whole  was  saved  from  ugliness  by  a  large  central 
gable  the  overhanging  porch  of  which  cast  a  deep  and 
friendly  shadow  over  the  great  front  door  and  over  the 
wide  flights  of  steps  that  led  down  to  the  curving  drive- 
way. 

In  that  luxuriant  clime  the  new  house  did  not  long 
remain  bare.  A  clambering  wistaria,  tree-like  geran- 
iums, a  giant  fuchsia  and  trellised  rose-vines  soon  em- 
bowered the  verandas,  while,  on  the  south  side,  Eng- 
lish ivy  was  gradually  coaxed  up  the  bare  brick  wall. 
This  medley  of  leaf  and  bloom  gave  to  the  whole  house 
that  air  of  friendliness  and  homeliness  that  marks  the 
shrine  of  the  Anglo-Saxon's  household  gods  the  world 
over. 

Such  was  the  nest  that  the  Reverend  Orme  built  by 
the  sweat  of  his  brow  to  harbor  his  little  family,  which, 
at  the  beginning  of  this  history,  consisted  of  himself; 
Ann  Leighton,  his  wife ;  and  Mammy,  black  as  the  ace 
of  spades  without,  white  within. 


CHAPTER   II 

ANN  SUTHERLAND  LEIGHTON  was  one  of 
those  rare  religionists  that  occasionally  bloom  in 
a  most  unaccountable  manner  on  a  family  tree  having 
its  roots  in  the  turf  rather  than  clinging  to  Plymouth 
Rock.  Isaac  Sutherland,  her  father,  had  been  knowing 
in  horse-flesh,  and  would  have  looked  askance  on  the 
Reverend  Orme  Leighton  as  a  suitor  had  he  not  also 
been  knowing  in  men.  The  truth  was  that  in  Leighton 
the  man  was  bigger  than  the  parson,  and  to  the  conceded 
fact  that  all  the  world  loves  a  lover  he  added  the  prestige 
of  the  less-bandied  truth  that  all  the  world  loves  a 
fighter.  He,  also,  knew  horse-flesh.  He  finally  won 
Ann's  father  over  on  the  day  when  Ike  Sutherland 
learned  to  his  cost  that  the  Reverend  Orme  could  dis- 
cern through  the  back  of  his  head  that  distension  of  the 
capsular  ligament  of  the  hock  commonly  termed  a  bog 
spavin. 

Ann  did  not  share  her  husband's  extreme  views.  It 
was  a  personal  loyalty  that  had  brought  her  uncomplain-1 
ing  to  a  far  country,  unbuoyed  by  the  Reverend  Orme's 
dreams  of  a  new  state,  but  seeking  with  an  inward  ferj 
vidness  some  scene  of  lasting  peace  wherewith  to  blot 

8 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS        9 

out  the  memory  of  long  years  of  turmoil  and  wholesale 
bereavement. 

To  her  those  first  years  in  Consolation  Cottage  were 
long — long  with  the  weight  of  six  thousand  miles  from 
home.  Then,  with  the  suddeness  of  answered  prayer, 
a  light  came  into  her  darkness.  He  was  named  Shenton. 
Mammy's  broad,  homesick  face  broke  into  an  undying 
smile.  "Sho  is  mo'  lak  ole  times,  Mis'  Ann,  havin'  a 
young  Marster  abeout."  And  when,  two  years  later,  on 
a  Christmas  day,  Natalie  was  born,  Mammy  mixed 
smiles  with  tears  and  sobbed,  "Oh,  Mis'  Ann,  sho  is  mo' 
an'  mo'  lak  ole  times." 

She,  too,  had  her  clinging  memories  of  halls,  now 
empty,  that  echoed  once  to  the  cries  and  gurgling  laugh- 
ter of  a  race  in  full  flower. 

As  Ann  sat  one  evening  on  the  embowered  veranda 
looking  away  to  the  north,  a  child  within  the  circle  of 
each  arm,  the  old  aching  in  her  breast  was  stilled.  The 
restless  Leighton  paused  in  his  stride  to  gaze  through 
fiery,  but  gloomy,  eyes  upon  his  fair-haired  baby  daugh- 
ter and  his  son,  pale,  crowned  with  dark  curls,  and  cried, 
with  a  toss  of  his  own  dark  mane:  "As  arrows  are  in 
the  hand  of  a  mighty  man,  so  are  children  of  the  youth. 
Happy  is  the  man  that  hath  his  quiver  full  of  them !" 

This  realization  of  the  preciousness  of  children  in 
adversity  paved  the  way  for  the  reception  of  one  who 
was  to  come  to  them  from  under  the  shacfow  of  a  family 


10       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

cloud,  a  certain  mysterious  personage  of  tender  years, 
Lewis  Leighton,  by  name. 

For  weeks  the  name  of  Lewis  Leighton  had  been 
whispered  about  the  house,  first  by  the  grown-ups  and 
finally,  when  the  Reverend  Orme  and  his  wife  had  come 
to  the  great  decision,  by  the  children.  The  children 
knew  nothing  of  the  great  decision  nor  did  they  know 
the  sources  of  their  sudden  joy.  Their  spirits  were 
reaching  out  to  clasp  this  new  thread  in  life  at  an  age 
when  all  new  threads  are  golden. 

On  the  appointed  day  the  Reverend  Orme  went  to 
the  nearest  seaport  to  meet  the  youthful  voyager  and 
convoy  him  home.  As  evening  drew  near,  great  was  the 
excitement  at  Consolation  Cottage.  To  Natalie  and  to 
Shenton,  the  sudden  arrival  of  an  entirely  new  brother, 
not  in  swaddling-clothes,  but  handed  down  ready-made 
from  the  shelf,  was  an  event  that  loomed  to  unusual 
proportions.  At  last  the  great  gate  swung  open,  and  a 
cab  rattled  its  leisurely  way  up  the  drive. 

In  an  instant  the  children  were  on  their  feet,  jumping 
up  and  down  and  clapping  their  hands.  "Mother," 
shouted  Shenton,  "they  're  coming!"  Little  Natalie 
clambered  in  stumbling  haste  up  the  steps  and  clutched 
Mrs.  Leighton's  skirts.  "Muwer,"  she  cried,  in  an 
agony  of  ecstasy,  "they  're  coming!" 

"Yes,  yes,  dear ;  I  see.  Oh,  look  how  you'  ve  rumpled 
your  dress!  What  will  Lewis  say  to  that?  Come, 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       11 

Shenton,  give  mother  your  hand."  Slowly  she  led  them 
down  the  steps,  her  eyes  fixed  on  the  approaching  cab. 

The  Reverend  Orme  sprang  out  and  up  to  meet  them. 
He  kissed  his  wife  and  children.  Shenton  clung  to  his 
arm. 

"O  Dad,"  he  cried,  "did  n't  you  bring  him?" 

"Bring  him?  I  should  say  I  did.  Here,  step  out, 
young  man." 

A  chubby  face  above  a  blouse,  a  short  kilt  and  fat 
legs,  appeared  from  the  shadows  of  the  cab.  Grave  eyes 
passed  fearlessly  over  the  group  on  the  steps  until  they 
settled  on  the  broad  black  face  of  Mammy. 

"Bad  nigger !" 

Mrs.  Leighton  gasped  and  arrested  herself  in  the  very 
movement  of  welcome.  Mammy's  genial  face  assumed 
a  terrible  scowl,  her  white  eyes  bulged,  and  her  vast 
arms  went  suddenly  akimbo. 

"Wha'  's  that  yo'  say,  yo'  young  Marster  ?"  she  thun- 
dered. 

"Go — go — good  nigger,"  stuttered  the  chubby  face 
and  smiled.  With  that  he  was  swept  from  the  cab  into 
Mrs.  Leighton's  arms,  and  Mammy,  grinning  from  ear 
to  ear,  caught  him  by  one  fat  leg  and  demanded  in  soft 
negro  tones : 

"Wha'  fo'  you  call  yo'  mammy  *bad  niggah,'  young 
Marster?  Ho!  ho!  'Go — go — good  niggah!'  Did  yo' 
hea'  him,  Mis'  Ann  ?" 


12       THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Shenton  and  Natalie  jumped  up  and  down,  with  cries 
of  "Please,  Mother,"  and  "Muwer,  oh,  please!"  Mrs. 
Leighton  set  Lewis  on  his  feet  between  them.  Shenton 
held  out  his  hand.  "How  d'  ye." 

"How  do  do,"  replied  Lewis,  gravely.  Natalie  was 
plucking  at  his  arm.  He  turned  to  her.  They  were 
almost  of  a  size,  but  to  Natalie  he  towered  an  inch  above 
her.  She  held  up  her  lips,  and  he  kissed  them.  Then 
they  stood  and  stared  at  each  other.  Natalie's  short 
forefinger  found  its  way  to  her  mouth. 

"My  dwess  is  wumpled,"  she  said. 

"I  got  a  dog  at  home,"  declared  Lewis — "a  big  dog." 


CHAPTER   HI 

TO  Natalie,  Shenton,  and  Lewis  the  scant  twenty 
acres  that  surrounded  Consolation  Cottage  was 
a  vast  demesne.  Even  on  a  full  holiday  one  could 
choose  one's  excursions  within  its  limits.  From  the 
high-plumed  wall  of  bamboos  that  lined  Consolation 
Street,  through  the  orange-grove,  across  the  hollow 
where  were  stable  and  horses,  cows  and  calves,  then  up 
again  to  the  wood  on  the  other  hillside — ah,  that  was 
a  journey  indeed,  never  attempted  in  a  single  day.  They 
chose  their  playground.  To-day  the  bamboos  held  them, 
to-morrow  the  distant  grove,  where  were  pungent  fruits, 
birds'-nests,  fantastic  insects,  and  elusive  butterflies 
and  moths. 

Then  there  was  the  brier-patch,  with  its  secret  cham- 
ber. By  dint  of  long  hours  of  toil  and  a  purloined 
kitchen-knife  they  had  tunneled  into  a  clearing  in  the 
center  of  the  thicket.  Of  all  their  retreats,  this  one 
alone  had  foiled  their  watchful  overseers.  Here  was 
held,  undetected,  many  an  orgy  over  stolen  fruit. 

Nor  did  they  have  to  seek  far  for  a  realm  of  terror. 
Behind  the  brier-patch  was  the  priest's  wall.  Over  it 
was  wafted  the  fragrance  of  unknown  flowers  and  of 

13 


14      THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

strange  fruits — and  the  barking  of  a  fierce  dog.  With 
the  same  kitchen-knife  they  pried  loose  a  brick  and 
slipped  it  out.  They  took  turns  at  peeking  through 
this  tiny  window  on  a  strange  world.  What  ecstasy 
when  first  they  glimpsed  the  flat-hatted,  black-robed 
figure  strolling  in  the  wondrous  garden!  Then  terror 
seized  them,  for  the  quick-eyed  priest  had  seen  the  hole, 
and  before  they  could  flee  his  toe  was  in  it,  and  his 
frowning  face,  surmounted  by  the  flaring  hat,  popped 
above  the  wall  and  glared  down  upon  them. 

"Do  you  hear  my  dog  ?"  whispered  the  priest. 

It  was  ]STatalie,  trembling  with  fright,  who  answered, 
feeling  a  certain  kinship  for  anything  in  skirts. 

"Yeth,  I  do." 

"Well,"  whispered  the  priest,  his  face  twitching  in 
the  effort  to  look  stern,  "he  eats  little  children."  With 
that  he  dropped  from  view. 

Lewis  and  Shenton  stared  at  each  other.  Natalie 
began  to  cry.  Lewis  picked  up  the  brick  and  slipped  it 
back  into  place.  Shenton  helped  him  wedge  it  in  with 
twigs;  then  all  three  stole  away,  to  break  into  giggles 
and  laughter  when  distance  gave  them  courage. 

Natalie  and  Lewis  had  another  terror,  unshared  by 
Shenton.  Manoel,  the  Portuguese  gardener,  who  lived 
in  a  little  two-room  house  in  the  hollow,  had  nothing  but 
scowls  for  them.  They  feared  him  with  the  instinctive 
fear  of  children,  but  Shenton  was  his  friend.  Did  any 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS       15 

little  tiff  arise,  Shenton  was  off  to  see  Manoel.  He 
knew  the  others  were  afraid  to  follow.  Sometimes  Ma- 
noel took  him  to  his  little  house. 

To  Lewis  this  strange  friendship  was  the  one  cloud 
in  childhood's  happy  sky.  He  could  not  have  denned 
what  he  felt.  It  was  jealousy  mixed  with  hurt  pride — 
jealousy  of  the  hated  Manoel,  hurt  pride  at  the  thought 
that  Shenton  went  where  he  could  not  follow. 

One  day  Shenton  had  been  gone  an  hour.  Lewis  had 
seen  him  with  Manoel.  He  knew  he  was  in  Manoel's 
house.  What  were  they  doing?  Lewis  turned  to  Na- 
talie. 

"I  am  going  to  Manoel's  house.    Stay  here." 

Natalie  stared  at  him  with  wide  eyes. 

"O,  Lewis,"  she  cried  after  him,  "are  n't  you 
'fraidr 

Lewis  crawled  stealthily  to  a  back  window.  He  stood 
on  tiptoe  and  tried  to  look  in.  His  eyes  were  just  be- 
low the  level  of  the  window-sill.  He  dragged  a  log  of 
wood  beneath  the  window  and  climbed  upon  it.  For  a 
long  time  he  kept  his  face  glued  against  one  of  the  little 
square  panes  of  glass. 

He  forgot  fear.  In  the  room  which  the  window 
commanded  was  a  broad,  rough  table,  and  Manoel  was 
seated  on  a  bench  before  it,  leaning  forward,  his  long 
arms  outstretched  along  its  edge.  The  table  was  pushed 
almost  against  the  wall,  and  in  its  center  stood  Shenton, 


16       THKOUGH   STAINED   GLASS 

laughing  till  the  tears  ran  down  his  cheeks.  His  curly 
hair  was  damp  and  clung  to  his  white  forehead.  His 
blouse  was  soiled,  his  kilt  awry.  One  short  stocking  had 
fallen  down  over  his  shoe.  Manoel  was  also  laughing, 
but  silently. 

Lewis  did  not  have  to  wait  long  to  divine  the  source 
of  mirth,  for  Shenton  soon  essayed  to  walk  the  length 
of  the  table.  Lifting  his  arm,  he  pointed  along  a  crack, 
and  swung  one  leg  around  to  take  a  first  step.  But  he 
seemed  unable  to  place  his  foot  as  he  wished.  He  reeled 
and  fell  in  a  giggling  ball,  which  Manoel  saved  from 
rolling  to  the  floor. 

Shrieks  of  laughter,  deadened  by  the  closed  window, 
came  from  the  child,  and  Manoel's  broad  shoulders  shook 
with  enjoyment.  He  stood  Shenton  on  his  feet,  and 
held  him  till  he  got  his  balance;  then  the  play  began 
again.  Now  Lewis  felt  fear  steal  over  him,  yet  he  could 
not  go  away.  There  was  something  inexpressibly  comi- 
cal in  the  scene,  but  it  was  not  this  that  held  him.  A 
strange  terror  had  seized  him.  Something  was  the  mat- 
ter with  Shenton.  Lewis  did  not  know  wjiat  it  was. 

Suddenly  Shenton's  mood  changed  to  sullen  stupor, 
and  Manoel,  whose  gait  was  also  unsteady,  picked  him 
up  and  carried  him  to  a  spigot,  where  he  carefully  un- 
buttoned the  child's  waist  and  soaked  his  head  in  cold 
water.  The  charm  was  broken.  Lewis  fled. 


CHAPTEE   IV 

ROUTINE  is  the  murderer  of  time.  Held  by  the 
daily  recurring  duties  of  her  household,  Ann 
Leighton  awoke  with  a  gasp  to  the  day  that  Natalie's 
hair  went  into  pigtails  and  the  boys  shed  kilts  for  trous- 
ers. At  the  evening  hour  she  gathered  the  children  to 
her  with  an  increased  tenderness.  Natalie,  plump  and 
still  rosy,  sat  in  her  lap;  Shenton,  a  mere  wisp  of  a 
boy,  his  face  pale  with  a  pallor  beyond  the  pallor  of  the 
tropics,  pressed  his  dark,  curly  head  against  her  heart. 
Her  other  arm  encircled  Lewis  and  held  him  tight,  for 
he  was  prone  to  fidget. 

They  sat  on  the  west  veranda  and  watched  the  sun 
plunge  to  the  horizon  from  behind  a  bank  of  monster 
clouds.  Before  them  stretched  a  valley,  for  Consola- 
tion Cottage  was  set  upon  a  hill.  Beyond  the  valley, 
and  far  away,  rose  a  line  of  hills.  Suddenly  that  line 
became  a  line  of  night.  Black  night  seized  upon  all  the 
earth;  but  beyond  there  arose  into  the  heavens  a  light 
that  was  more  glorious  than  the  light  of  day.  A  long 
sea  of  gold  seemed  to  slope  away  ever  so  gently,  up  and 
up,  until  it  lost  itself  beneath  the  slumberous  mass  of 
clouds  that  curtained  its  farther  shore.  Here  and  there 

17 


18       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

within  the  sea  hung  islets  of  cloud,  as  still  as  rocks  in  a 
waveless  ocean. 

Natalie  stretched  out  her  hand,  with  chubby  fingers 
outspread,  and  squinted  between  the  black  bars  they 
made  against  the  light. 

"Mother,  what  's  all  that  ?" 

Mrs.  Leighton  was  silent  for  a  moment.  The  chil- 
dren looked  up  expectantly  into  her  face,  but  she  was 
not  looking  down  at  them.  Her  gaze  was  fixed  upon 
the  afterglow. 

"Why,"  she  said  at  last,  "it  's  a  painting  of  heaven 
and  earth.  You  see  the  black  plain  that  stretches  away 
and  away  ?  That 's  our  world,  so  dark,  so  full  of  ruts,  so 
ugly;  but  it  is  the  rough  plain  we  all  must  travel  to 
reach  the  shore  of  light.  When  life  is  over,  we  come  to 
the  end  of  night — over  there.  Then  we  sail  out  on  the 
golden  sea." 

"Are  those  islands?"  asked  Lewis,  pointing  to  the 
suspended  cloudlets. 

"Yes,  islands." 

"D'  you  see  that  biggest  one — the  one  with  a  castle 
and  smoke  and  trees  ?"  continued  Lewis.  "That  's  the 
one  /  'm  going  to  sail  to." 

"Me,  too,"  said  Natalie. 

"No,  Natalie,  you  can't.  Not  to  that  one,  because 
you're  littlest.  You  must  sail  to  that  littlest  one  'way, 
'way  over  there."  Lewis  pointed  far  to  the  south. 


THROUGH    STAINED   GLASS       19 

Natalie  shook  her  head  solemnly. 

"No.    I  '11  sail  to  the  big  island,  too." 

"And  you,  dear?"  said  Mrs.  Leighton  to  Shenton, 
looking  down  at  his  motionless  head.  Shenton  did  not 
answer.  He  was  held  by  a  sudden,  still,  unhealthy 
sleep. 

Mrs.  Leighton  let  Lewis  go,  pushed  Natalie  gently 
from  her  lap,  and  gathered  her  first-born  in  her  arms. 

"Run  to  mammy,  children,"  she  said. 

Holding  the  sleeping  Shenton  close  to  her,  she  turned 
a  troubled  face  toward  the  afterglow.  The  golden  sea 
was  gone.  There  was  a  last  glimmer  of  amber  in  the 
heavens,  but  it  faded  suddenly,  as  though  somewhere 
beyond  the  edge  of  the  world  some  one  had  put  out  the 
light.  Night  had  fallen. 

Mrs.  Leighton  carried  her  boy  into  the  house.  She 
stopped  at  hei  husband's  study  door. 

"Orme,  are  you  there  ?"  she  called.     "Please  come." 

There  was  the  sound  of  a  chair  scraping  back.  The 
door  was  flung  open.  Leighton  looked  from  Ann's  face 
to  her  burden,  and  his  own  face  paled. 

"Again?"  he  asked. 

"0,  Orme,"  cried  Ann,  "I'm  frightened.  What  is  it, 
Orme  ?  Dr.  MacDonald  must  come.  Send  for  him. 
We  must  know !" 

The  Reverend  Orme  took  the  boy  from  her  arms  and 


20       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

carried  him  into  a  spare  bedroom.  He  laid  him  down. 
Shenton's  head  fell  limply  to  one  side  upon  the  pillow. 
The  pillow  was  white,  but  not  whiter  than  the  boy's 
face. 

MacDonald's  gruff  voice  was  soon  heard  in  the  hall. 

"Not  one  of  the  bairns,  Mammy?  Young  Shenton, 
eh  ?"  He  came  into  the  room  and  sat  down  beside  the 
boy.  He  felt  his  pulse,  undid  his  waist,  listened  to  his 
heart  and  lungs.  The  doctor  shook  his  head  and 
frowned.  "Nothing  extra-ordinary — nothing."  Then 
he  brought  his  face  close  to  the  boy's  mouth,  closer  and 
closer. 

The  doctor  sank  back  in  his  chair.  His  shrewd  eyes 
darted  from  boy  to  father,  then  to  the  mother. 

"Do  not  be  alarmed,"  he  said  to  Mrs.  Leighton ;  "the 
lad  is  pheesically  sound.  He  will  awake  anon."  The 
doctor  arose,  and  stretched  his  arms.  "Eh,  but  I  Ve  had 
a  hard  day.  Will  ye  be  sae  gude  as  to  give  me  a  glass 
of  wine,  Mistress  Leighton  ?" 

Ann  started  as  though  from  a  trance. 

"Wine,  Doctor  ?"  she  stammered.  "I  'm  sorry.  We 
have  no  wine  in  the  house." 

"Not  even  a  drop  of  whisky  ?" 

Ann  shook  her  head. 

"Nae  whisky  in  the  medicine-chest,  nae  cooking 
sherry  in  the  pantry  ?  Weel,  weel,  I  must  be  gaeing." 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      21 

And  without  a  look  at  Ann's  rising  color  or  the  Rev- 
erend Orme's  twitching  face  the  doctor  was  gone. 

The  Reverend  Orme  fixed  his  eyes  upon  his  wife. 

"When  the  boy  awakes,"  he  said,  "not  a  word  to  him. 
Send  him  to  my  study."  Ann  nodded.  As  the  door 
closed,  she  fell  upon  her  knees  beside  the  bed. 

An  hour  later  the  study  door  opened.  Shenton  en- 
tered. His  father  was  seated,  his  nervous  hands  grip- 
ping the  arms  of  his  chair.  On  the  desk  beside  him  lay 
a  thin  cane.  He  motioned  to  his  son  to  stand  before 
him. 

"My  boy,"  he  said,  "tell  me  each  thing  you  have  done 
to-day." 

There  was  a  slight  pause. 

"I  have  forgotten  what  I  did  to-day,"  answered  Shen- 
ton, his  eyes  fixed  on  his  father's  face. 

"That  is  a  falsehood,"  breathed  Leighton,  tensely, 
"I  am  going  to  thrash  you  until  you  remember." 

Leighton  saw  his  boy's  frail  body  shrink,  he  saw  a 
flush  leap  to  his  cheeks  and  fade,  leaving  them  dead- 
white  again.  Then  he  looked  into  his  son's  eyes,  and 
the  hand  with  which  he  was  groping  for  the  cane 
stopped,  poised  in  air.  In  those  eyes  there  was  some- 
thing that  no  man  could  thrash.  Scorn,  anguish,  pride, 
the  knowledge  of  ages,  gazed  out  from  a  child's  eyes 
upon  Leighton,  and  struck  terror  to  his  soul.  His  boy's 


22       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

frail  body  was  the  abiding-place  of  a  power  that  laughed 
at  the  strength  of  man's  hands. 

"My  boy,  O,  my  boy !"  groaned  Leighton. 

"Father !"  cried  Shenton,  with  the  cry  of  a  bursting 
heart,  and  hurled  himself  into  his  father's  arms. 


CHAPTER   V 

THE  next  day  was  the  first  of  the  long  vacation, 
and  with  it  came  an  addition  to  the  Leighton 
household.  Mammy  was  given  a  temporary  helper,  a 
shrewd  little  maid,  with  a  head  thirty  years  old  on 
shoulders  of  twelve.  Lalia  was  her  name.  The  Rev- 
erend Orme  had  chosen  her  from  among  his  charity 
pupils.  He  himself  gave  her  his  instructions — never  to 
leave  Shenton  except  to  run  and  report  the  moment  he 
escaped  from  her  charge. 

Lalia  was  accepted  without  suspicion  by  the  children 
not  as  a  nurse,  but  as  a  playmate.  Weeks  passed.  The 
four  played  together  with  a  greater  harmony  than  the 
three  had  ever  attained.  Day  after  day  the  Reverend 
Orme  sat  waiting  in  his  study  and  brooding.  The 
dreaded  call  never  came.  He  began  to  distrust  his  mes- 
senger. 

Then  one  stifling  afternoon  as  he  sat  dozing  in  his 
chair  a  sharp  rap  on  the  study  door  awakened  him  with 
a  start. 

"Master !    Master !"  called  Lalia's  voice. 

"Yes,  yes,"  cried  Leighton ;  "come  in." 
23 


24       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

As  he  rose  from  his  chair  Lalia  entered.  She  was 
breathless  with  running. 

"Master,"  she  said,  "Shenton  did  quarrel  with  us. 
He  has  gone  to  Manoel — to  his  house." 

"Manoel !"  cried  Leighton,  "Manoel !"  and  strode  hat- 
less  out  into  the  glaring  sun,  across  the  lawn,  and  down 
the  loquat  avenue. 

Lewis,  standing  with  Natalie  in  the  orange-orchard, 
stared,  wondering,  at  that  hurrying  figure.  Never  had 
he  seen  the  Reverend  Orme  walk  like  that,  hatless,  head 
hanging  and  swinging  from  side  to  side,  fists  clenched. 
Where  could  he  he  going?  Suddenly  he  knew.  The 
Reverend  Orme  was  going  to  Manoel's  house.  Shenton 
was  there.  Lalia  came  running  to  them.  "Hold  Na- 
talie !"  Lewis  cried  to  her,  and  sped  away  to  warn  Shen- 
ton of  danger.  He  ran  with  all  the  speed  of  his  eight 
years,  but  from  the  first  he  felt  he  was  too  late.  The 
low-hanging  branches  of  the  orange-trees  hindered  him. 

When  he  burst  through  the  last  of  them,  he  saw  the 
Reverend  Orme's  tall  figure,  motionless  now,  standing 
at  the  soiled,  small-paned  window  of  Manoel's  house. 
As  he  stared,  the  tall  figure  crouched  and  stole  out  of 
sight,  around  the  corner  toward  the  door.  Lewis  rushed 
to  the  window  and  looked  in.  It  seemed  to  him  only  a 
day  since  he  had  had  to  drag  a  log  to  stand  on  to  see 
through  this  same  window. 

Shenton  was  sitting  on  the  bench  beside  the  table,  his 


THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS       25 

black,  curly  head  hanging  to  one  side.  Beyond  him  sat 
Manoel,  leering  and  jabbering.  Between  them  was  a 
bottle.  Lewis's  lips  were  opening  for  a  cry  of  warning 
when  the  door  was  flung  wide,  and  the  Reverend  Orme 
stepped  into  the  room.  Lewis  could  not  see  Shenton's 
face,  but  he  saw  his  slight  form  suddenly  straighten. 

Then  he  realized  with  a  great  relief  that  the  Reverend 
Orme  was  not  looking  at  Shenton;  his  gaze  was  fas- 
tened on  Manoel.  Lewis,  too,  turned  his  eyes  on  Ma- 
noel. Cold  sweat  came  out  over  him  as  he  saw  the 
terror  in  Manoel's  face.  The  leer  was  still  there,  frozen. 
Over  it  and  through  it,  like  a  double  exposure  on  a 
single  negative,  hung  the  film  of  terror.  The  Reverend 
Orme,  his  hands  half  outstretched,  walked  slowly  toward 
Manoel. 

Suddenly  the  Portuguese  crouched  as  though  to 
spring.  As  quick  as  the  gleam  of  a  viper's  tongue, 
Leighton's  long  arms  shot  out.  Straight  for  the  man's 
throat  went  his  hands.  They  closed,  the  long,  white 
fingers  around  a  swarthy  neck,  thumbs  doubled  in,  their 
knuckles  sinking  into  the  throat.  Lewis  felt  as  though 
it  were  his  own  eyes  that  started  from  their  sockets. 
With  a  scream,  he  turned  and  ran. 

He  cast  himself  beneath  the  shelter  of  the  first  low- 
hanging  orange-tree.  He  saw  the  Reverend  Orme  stalk 
by,  bearing  Shenton  in  his  arms.  For  the  first  time  in 
his  life  Lewis  heard  the  sobs  of  a  grown  man,  and  in- 


26       THEOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

stinctively  knew  himself  the  possessor  of  a  secret  thing 
— a  thing  that  must  never  be  told. 

At  the  house,  alarmed  by  Natalie's  incoherent,  ex- 
cited chatter  and  Lalia's  stubborn  silence,  Mrs.  I  eighton 
waited  in  suspense.  Leighton  entered  with  his  burden 
and  laid  it  down.  Then  he  turned.  She  saw  his  face. 

"Onne !"  she  cried,  "Ormel"  and  started  toward  him, 
groping  as  though  she  had  been  blinded. 

"Touch  me  not,  Ann,"  spoke  Leighton,  with  a  strange 
calmness.  "Thank  God!  the  mark  of  Cain  is  on  my 
brow." 


CHAPTEE   VI 

THAT  very  night  Leighton  sought  out  his  friend, 
the  chief  of  police.  He  told  him  his  story  from 
the  first  creeping  fear  for  his  boy  to  the  moment  of  ter- 
rible vengeance. 

"So  you  killed  him,  eh?"  said  the  chief,  tossing  his 
cigarette  from  him  and  thoughtfully  lighting  another. 
"Too  bad.  You  ought  to  have  come  to  me  first,  my 
friend,  turned  him  over  to  us  for  a  beating.  It  would 
have  come  to  the  same  thing  in  the  end  and  saved  you 
a  world  of  trouble.  But  what 's  done,  is  done.  Now  we 
must  think.  What  do  you  suggest  ?" 

Amazement  dawned  in  Leighton's  haggard  face. 

"What  do  7  suggest  ?"  he  answered.  "What  does  the 
law  suggest,  sir?  Are  there  no  courts  and  prison-bars 
in  this  country  for — for " 

"There,  there/'  interrupted  the  chief.  "As  you  say, 
there  are  courts,  of  course,  gaols,  too ;  but  our  accommo- 
dations for  criminals  are  not  suitable  for  gentlemen." 

"It  is  not  for  me  to  choose  my  accommodation,  sir.  I 
am  here  to  pay  the  penalty  of  my  crime.  I  have  come 
to  be  arrested." 

"Arrested?"  repeated  the  chief,  staring  at  Leighton. 
27 


28       THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Are  you  not  my  friend  ?  Are  you  not  the  friend  of  all 
of  us  that  count  ?" 

"But — but "  stammered  Leighton. 

"Yes,  sir,"  repeated  the  chief,  "my  friend." 

"What  do  you  mean  ?"  cried  Leighton.  "Do  you  mean 
you  will  leave  my  punishment  to  my  conscience — to 
my  God  ?" 

The  chief  looked  at  him  quizzically. 

"Your  punishment  ?  Why,  certainly.  To  your  God, 
if  you  like.  But  let  us  get  down  to  business.  You  are 
nervous.  Quite  natural.  When  I  was  an  irresponsible 
student,  I  killed  a  servant  for  waking  me  on  the  morn- 
ing after  a  spree.  I  remember  I  was  nervous  for  weeks. 
Now  sit  still.  Calm  yourself.  Let  me  think  for  you. 
In  fact,  while  we  've  been  chatting,  I  have  thought  for 

you." 

The  chief  leaned  back  in  his  chair  and  placed  his 
finger-tips  together. 

"Listen.  When  it  becomes  necessary,  I  shall  block  all 
roads — all  exits  from  the  city — by  telegraph.  There 
is  one  highway— the  road  into  the  interior — without 
telegraph  as  yet.  We  should  never  think  of  blocking 
that. 

"Now,  as  to  time  available.  Let  us  be  on  the  safe 
side.  You  must  get  away  to-morrow.  You  have  horses, 
a  wagon,  stable-hands.  Have  you  a  tent  ?  No.  I  will 
lend  you  one — a  large  bell  tent. 


THROUGH   STAINED   GLASS      29 

"Now,  as  to  affairs — your  property  in  this  town. 
You  will  sign  papers  making  your  friend  Lawyer  Lima 
Rodolpho  and  me  joint  trustees.  He  is  my  bitterest 
enemy,  and  I  am  his.  In  this  way  you  can  rest  assured 
that  neither  of  us  will  rob  you." 

Leighton  made  a  deprecating  gesture.  The  chief 
raised  his  hand  and  smiled. 

"Ah,"  he  said,  "do  not  rob  me  of  that  thought.  It 
was  a  stroke  of  genius.  Between  us,"  he  continued, 
"we  will  advance  you  all  the  money  you  will  need  for 
a  year.  By  that  time  we  can  send  you  more."  He  rose, 
and  held  out  his  hand.  "Now,  my  friend,  go,  and  God 
go  with  you !" 

Leighton  took  the  chief's  hand. 

"Good-by.    I— I  thank  you." 

"Not  at  all,"  said  the  chief,  with  a  hearty  grip.  "To- 
morrow, eh?  Get  away  to-morrow." 

Leighton  walked  out  and  home  in  a  daze.  The  re- 
membrance of  the  agony  in  which  he  had  resigned  him- 
self to  the  abandonment  of  his  family,  to  notoriety,  dis- 
grace, and  retribution,  clung  to  him.  What  had  seemed 
a  nightmare,  with  an  awakening  bound  to  come,  now 
became  a  waking  dream,  more  terrible,  because  no  dawn 
could  give  it  end. 

But  the  chief  had  been  wise.  He  had  left  Leighton 
no  time  for  disastrous  introspection.  Action,  work,  that 
sovereign  antidote  for  troubled  minds,  seized  upon  him. 


30       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

He  told  Mrs.  Leighton  in  as  few  words  as  possible  what 
had  happened. 

She,  too,  was  dazed  by  the  chief's  philosophy  of 
friendship. 

"But,  Orme "  she  began. 

"I  know,  I  know,  Ann,"  he  interrupted.  "Only,  we 
have  n't  time  to  think  now,  nor  time  to  talk.  Call 
mammy.  Kemember,  we  have  but  the  one  wagon.  Pack 
carefully." 

He  himself  hurried  off  to  arouse  the  stable-hand.  The 
stable-hand  had  not  been  to  Manoel's  house.  He  knew 
nothing  of  what  had  happened.  He  worked  most  of  the 
night  cheerfully,  preparing  for  the  welcome  camping- 
trip. 

By  noon  on  the  following  day,  when  streets  and  coun- 
try roads  lay  deserted  under  the  tropic  sun,  the  caval- 
cade was  off.  The  wagon,  drawn  by  two  mules  in  charge 
of  the  stable-hand,  led  the  way.  It  was  laden  with  tent, 
baggage,  and  the  women-folk,  Ann,  Natalie,  and 
mammy.  Behind  followed  Leighton  on  his  favorite 
horse  and  Shenton  and  Lewis  on  their  ponies.  By  sun- 
down they  reached  the  banks  of  the  Tiete.  It  took  men 
and  boys  an  hour  to  set  the  big  bell  tent. 


CHAPTEE   VII 

BECAUSE  the  road  led  north,  they  traveled  north. 
Week  after  week,  month  after  month,  sometimes 
by  hard,  long  stretches  where  water  was  scarce,  some- 
times lingering  where  pasturage  was  good,  sometimes 
halting  to  let  a  fever  run  its  course,  they  pushed  north- 
ward. The  farther  they  went,  the  more  barren  became 
the  wilderness.  The  feudal  mansions  of  the  wealthy 
coffee-planters  gave  way  to  the  miserable  abodes  of  a 
land  of  drought.  But  houses  were  never  far  between, 
and  wherever  there  were  houses,  there  was  cane  rum. 
It  was  so  cheap  it  was  often  given  away  for  a  smile. 

Twice  in  the  long  months  Shenton  had  eluded  his 
watchful  father,  once  by  slipping  his  saddle-cloth  and 
going  back  to  pick  it  up,  and  once  by  riding  ahead  on  a 
misty  morning.  Each  time  he  stole  back  with  hanging 
and  drooping  shoulders.  The  look  of  utter  despondency 
and  gloomy  despair  in  his  eyes  wrung  his  parents' 
hearts,  held  back  his  father's  hand  from  wrath. 

Of  them  all,  Shenton  suffered  most  from  fever.  There 
came  a  time  when  he  could  no  longer  ride.  Natalie, 
grown  pale  and  thin,  but  strong  withal,  took  his  place 

31 


32       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

on  the  pony  and  he  hers  on  the  wagon.  There  he  lay 
long  hours  in  his  mother's  arms. 

When  all  the  storms  of  life  had  swept  over  her,  Ann 
Leighton  looked  back  upon  those  days  as  the  abiding- 
place  of  her  dearest  memories.  Safe  within  the  circle 
of  her  arms  lay  her  boy.  There  no  evil  could  reach  him, 
no  gnawing  temptation  ravage  his  child's  will.  Her 
watchful  love  warded  off  the  gloomy  hour.  His  prattle 
of  childish  things  warmed  her  heart  until  it  swelled  to 
an  exquisite  agony  of  content. 

One  day  they  awoke  to  a  new  presence  on  the  flat 
horizon.  Far,  far  away  rose  a  mountain  from  the  plain. 
It  was  wonderfully  symmetrical,  rising  to  a  single  peak. 
All  day  long  they  traveled  toward  it.  All  day  long 
Shenton  kept  his  somber  eyes  fixed  upon  it.  Toward 
evening  he  raised  his  face  to  his  mother's.  She  leaned 
over  him. 

"Mother,"  he  whispered,  "I  should  like  to  reach  the 
mountain." 

Tears  welled  from  her  eyes  and  trickled  down  her 
cheeks.  She  held  Shenton's  curly  head  against  her  face 
so  that  he  could  not  see.  She  stifled  a  sob  and  whis- 
pered back : 

"My  boy,  you  will  reach  the  mountain." 

The  next  day  a  man  of  the  country  joined  them.  He 
was  dressed  in  a  suit  and  hat  of  deerskin.  On  his  feet 
were  sandals.  Across  one  shoulder  he  carried  a  stick 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      33 

from  which  dangled  a  bundle.  His  quick,  springy  stride 
carried  him  easily  beside  the  cavalcade. 

"The  blessing  of  God  be  upon  your  Mercies,"  was 
his  greeting.  "Whence  do  you  come  and  whither  do  you 
go?  Tell  him  who  so  rudely  asks,  I  beg  you.  I  am 
John,  the  Courier." 

Ann  and  the  Reverend  Orme  looked  vaguely  at  each 
other.  They  had  no  answer.  But  Shenton  spoke. 

"Friend,"  he  said,  "we  come  from  the  South.  We 
journey  to  yonder  mountain.  What  is  it  called  ?" 

"It  is  called  the  Sorcerer." 

"The  Sorcerer  ?"  cried  Shenton.  "That  is  a  strange 
name." 

"It  is  called  the  Sorcerer,"  said  the  man,  "because  it 
deceives.  It  is  a  landmark  in  the  wilderness,  but  it 
shows  no  man  the  way.  So  equal  are  its  sides,  that  it 
points  neither  east  nor  west  nor  south  nor  north.  Upon 
its  summit  is  a  single  tree,  planted  by  no  human  hands." 

"I  see  the  tree,"  said  Shenton.  "Mother,  do  you  see 
the  tree  ?  It  is  like  the  steeple  on  a  church."  Then  he 
turned  to  the  courier.  "Friend,  the  mountain  points 
upward." 

They  camped  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  for  fever 
had  laid  its  final  grip  upon  Shenton.  He  was  too  weak 
to  stand  the  jolting  of  the  wagon.  One  night,  while  ly- 
ing in  his  mother's  arms,  he  slipped  away  from  life. 

Leighton  looked  upon  his  boy's  face,  still  alight  with 


34      THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

content  at  having  reached  the  mountain,  upon  his  white, 
blue-veined  body,  so  pitifully  frail,  and  marveled  that 
a  frame  so  weak,  so  tender,  so  peaceful,  had  been  only 
now  a  mighty  battle-field. 

He  gathered  up  the  body  in  his  arms,  and  calling 
roughly  to  Lewis  to  bring  an  ax,  he  started  up  the  bar- 
ren mountainside. 

Ann,  dumb  and  tearless,  stood  before  the  tent,  and 
watched  him  with  unseeing  eyes.  Natalie,  crying, 
clutched  her  skirt.  At  her  feet  sat  mammy,  her  face  up- 
turned, tears  flowing,  her  body  swaying  to  her  sobs. 

Up  and  up  climbed  Leighton  with  Lewis  panting  be- 
hind him.  They  reached  the  towering  summit  of  the 
mountain. 

A  great  rock  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  lonely  tree.  Be- 
neath it  Leighton  dug  with  ax  and  hands.  He  tore 
branches  from  the  tree  and  spread  them  within.  Upon 
the  fresh,  green  couch  he  laid  the  body  of  his  boy.  He 
fell  upon  his  knees  before  it  and  tried  to  pray,  but  could 
not. 

"O,  Death,"  he  groaned,  "to  this  young  soul  hast  thou 
been  kind."  Then  with  many  stones  they  closed  the 
tomb. 

Leighton  looked  wistfully  about  him.  He  was  seized 
by  the  primitive  desire  of  man  to  leave  some  visible 
sign  of  overwhelming  grief.  His  eyes  rose  above  the 
rock  to  the  lonely  tree.  Grasping  the  ax,  he  climbed  the 


THKiOUGH    STAINED   GLASS      35 

tree.  High  above  the  mountain-top  he  cut  its  stem. 
Then  limb  after  limb  fell  crashing  to  the  earth  until 
only  two  were  left.  Out  one  and  then  the  other  he 
clambered  and  cut  them  off.  The  lonely  tree  was  no 
more ;  in  its  place  stood  a  mighty  cross. 

From  far  away  across  the  plain,  John,  the  Courier, 
looked  back.  His  keen  eyes  fell  upon  the  mountain. 
He  stopped  and  stared. 

"Ah,  Sorcerer,"  he  murmured,  "hast  thou  now  a 
heart?  What  power  has  crowned  thy  brow  with  the 
holy  cross?  Behold!  one  arm  points  to  the  rising  sun 
and  one  to  its  setting.  I  shall  no  longer  call  thee  Sor- 
cerer, for  thou  art  become  the  Guide." 

At  the  edge  of  the  plain  stretched  a  line  of  hills. 
Within  them  was  a  little  valley  that  looked  toward  the 
distant  mountain.  Leighton  purchased  the  valley  from 
its  owner,  Dom  Francisco,  who  prized  it  lightly  beside 
his  vast  herds  of  cattle. 

At  the  top  of  the  valley,  and  facing  the  mountain, 
Leighton  built  his  new  abode,  four  walls  and  a  roof  of 
homemade  tiles.  When  it  was  finished,  he  looked  upon 
its  ugliness  and  said,  "The  Lord  hath  crushed  my  heart 
to  infinite  depths.  Let  us  call  this  place  Nadir." 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE  Leightons,  who  settled  at  Nadir  after  a  long 
year  of  pilgrimage,  looked  back  upon  the  happy 
years  at  Consolation  Cottage  as  the  dead  might  look 
back  upon  existence.  They  were  changed  indeed. 
Ann's  skin  had  lost  the  pale  pink  of  transplanted  North- 
ern blood.  Her  sweet  face  had  almost  lost  the  dignity 
of  sorrow.  It  was  lined,  weather-beaten,  at  times  almost 
vacant.  The  Reverend  Onne's  black  mane  had  suddenly 
turned  white  in  streaks.  A  perpetual  scowl  knitted  his 
brows.  To  mammy's  broad  countenance,  built  for  vast 
smiles,  had  come  a  look  of  plaintive  despair. 

Natalie  and  Lewis  were  at  the  weedy  age  of  nine.  It 
was  natural  that  they  should  have  changed,  but  their 
change  had  gone  beyond  nature.  Upon  them,  as  upon 
their  elders,  had  settled  the  silences  and  the  vaguely 
wondering  expression  of  those  who  live  in  lands  of 
drought  and  hardship,  who  look  upon  fate  daily. 

Both  of  the  children  had  become  thin  and  hard ;  but 
to  Lewis  had  come  a  greater  change.  His  brown  hair 
and  eyes  had  darkened  almost  to  black,  his  skin  taken 
on  an  olive  tinge.  His  face,  with  its  eager  eyes  some- 
times shining  like  the  high  lights  in  a  deep  pool  or  sud- 

36 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      37 

denly  grown  slumberous  with  dreams,  began  to  proclaim 
him  a  Leighton  of  the  Leightons.  So  evident  became 
the  badge  of  lineage  that  Ann  and  the  Reverend  Orme 
both  noticed  it.  To  Ann  it  meant  nothing,  but  in  the 
Reverend  Orme  it  aroused  bitter  memories  of  his  own 
boy.  He  began  to  avert  his  eyes  from  Lewis. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  Natalie  and  Lewis  cut 
their  names  to  Lew  and  Nat.  The  two  were  insep- 
arable. Each  had  a  pony,  and  they  roved  at  will  until 
the  sad  day  when  a  school  was  first  opened  in  that  wil- 
derness. 

It  happened  that  Dom  Francisco,  the  cattle  king  from 
whom  Leighton  had  purchased  Nadir,  was  a  widower 
twice  over  and  the  father  of  twenty  children,  many  of 
them  still  of  tender  years.  When  he  learned  that  Leigh- 
ton  had  been  a  schoolmaster,  he  did  not  rest  until  he  had 
persuaded  him  to  undertake  the  instruction  of  such  of 
his  children  as  were  not  already  of  use  on  the  ranch. 
The  Reverend  Orme  consented  from  necessity.  His  cash 
from  the  sale  of  Leighton  Academy  was  gone ;  the  rents 
from  Consolation  Cottage  were  small  and  reached  him 
at  long  intervals. 

Once  more  routine  fell  upon  the  Leighton  household  j 
once  more  the  years  stole  by. 

Lewis's  school  days  were  short.  The  Reverend  Orme 
found  that  he  could  not  stand  the  constant  sight  of  the 
boy's  face.  To  save  himself  from  the  shame  of  an  out- 


38      THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

burst,  he  had  bought  a  flock  of  goats  and  put  Lewis  in 
charge.  Sometimes  on  his  pony,  sometimes  on  foot, 
Lewis  wandered  with  his  flock  over  the  low  hills.  When 
the  rains  had  been  kind  and  the  wilderness  was  a  riot  of 
leaf  and  bloom  above  long  reaches  of  verdant  young 
grass,  his  journeys  were  short.  But  when  the  grass  was 
dry,  the  endless  thorn-trees  leafless,  and  the  whole  earth, 
stripped  of  Nature's  awnings,  weltered  under  a  brazen 
sky,  the  hardy  goats  carried  him  far  in  their  search  for 
sustenance. 

When  he  was  near,  Natalie  joined  him  as  soon  as 
school  and  household  duties  would  let  her.  Those  were 
happy,  quiet  hours.  Sometimes  she  brought  cookies,  hot 
from  mammy's  oven,  sometimes  the  richer  roly-poly, 
redolent  of  cinnamon  and  spice,  a  confection  prized  to 
this  day,  openly  by  the  young,  secretly  by  the  old.  Nor 
did  Lewis  receive  her  with  empty  hands.  One  day  a 
monster  guava,  kept  cool  under  moist  leaves,  greeted  her 
eyes ;  the  next,  a  brimming  hatful  of  the  tart  imbu.  If 
fruit  failed,  there  was  some  wondrous  toy  of  fingered 
clay  or  carved  wood,  or,  perhaps,  merely  a  glimpse  of 
some  furry  little  animal  drawn  to  Lewis's  knee  by  the 
power  of  vast  stillness. 

Lewis  could  not  have  told  what  it  was  he  felt  for 
Natalie.  She  was  not  beautiful,  as  children  of  the 
world  go.  Her  little  nose  was  saddled  with  freckles. 
Her  eyes  were  brown,  with  a  tinge  of  gold,  but  they 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS       39 

were  too  big  for  her  pale  face.  She  was  thin  and  lanky. 
Her  hair,  which  matched  the  color  of  her  eyes,  might 
have  been  beautiful,  but  hair  done  in  hard,  tight  braids 
has  no  chance  to  show  itself.  Lewis  only  knew  that 
even  when  most  grave  Natalie's  note  was  a  note  of  joy 
— the  only  note  of  joy  in  all  Nadir.  To  hear  her  cry, 
panting  from  her  haste,  "What  is  it  to-day,  Lew? 
A  guava  ?  O,  Lew,  what  a  beauty!"  was  ample  reward 
for  the  longest  search. 

But  there  were  days  when  Lewis  and  his  goats  were 
too  far  afield  for  Natalie  to  come.  On  those  days  Lewis 
carried  with  him  sometimes  a  book,  but  more  often  a 
lump  of  clay,  wrapped  in  a  wet  cloth.  He  would  cap- 
ture some  frolicking  kid  and  handle  him  for  an  hour, 
gently,  but  deeply,  seeking  out  bone  and  muscle  with 
his  thin,  nervous  fingers.  Then  he  would  mold  a  tiny 
and  clumsy  image  of  the  kid  in  clay.  No  sooner  was  it 
done  than  idleness  would  pall  upon  him.  Back  would 
go  the  clay  into  the  wet  cloth,  to  be  kneaded  into  a 
shapeless  mass  from  which  a  new  creation  might  spring 
forth,  a  full-grown  goat,  his  pony,  any  live  thing  upon 
which  he  could  first  lay  his  hands. 

Even  so,  those  days  were  long.  The  books  he  had 
read  many,  many  times.  Sometimes  the  clay  would 
turn  brittle  under  the  morning  sun,  sometimes  his  fin- 
gers forgot  what  cunning  they  had,  sometimes  black 
thought  fell  upon  him  and  held  him  till  he  felt  a  vague 


despair.  He  stood  within  the  threshold  of  manhood. 
Who  was  he  ?  What  was  life  ?  Was  this  life  ? 

About  him  men  married  and  begat  children,  goats 
begat  goats,  cattle  begat  cattle,  one  day  begat  another. 
Lewis  sat  with  hands  locked  about  his  knees  and  stared 
across  the  low  hills  out  into  the  wide  plain.  "The  Bible 
is  wrong,"  he  breathed  to  himself.  "The  world  will 
never,  never  end." 

Little  do  we  know  when  our  present  world  will  end. 
A  day  came  when  Dom  Francisco,  the  cattle  king,  whose 
herds  by  popular  account  were  as  the  sands  of  the  desert, 
asked  in  marriage  the  hand  of  Natalie. 

As,  toward  evening,  Lewis  headed  his  flock  for  home, 
he  saw  in  the  distance  a  pillar  of  dust.  It  came  rapidly 
to  him.  From  it  emerged  Natalie  on  her  pony.  She 
jumped  down,  slipped  the  reins  over  her  arm,  and 
joined  him. 

"You  have  come  far  and  fast,"  he  said,  glancing  at 
the  sweating  pony.  "Is  anything  the  matter  ?" 

"]$To,"  said  Natalie,  hesitatingly,  and  then  repeated 
— "no.  I  Ve  just  come  to  talk  to  you." 

For  some  time  they  walked  in  silence  behind  the 
great  herd  of  nervous  goats,  which  occasionally  stopped 
to  pasture,  but  more  often  scampered  ahead  till  a  call 
from  Lewis  checked  them.  Natalie  laid  her  hand  on 
the  sleeve  of  Lewis's  leather  coat,  a  gesture  with  which 
she  was  wont  to  claim  his  close  attention. 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      41 

"Lew,"  she  said,  "what  is  marriage  ?" 

Lewis  turned  and  looked  down  at  her.  They  were 
both  seventeen,  but  his  inch  start  of  her  had  grown  to 
half  a  foot. 

"Marriage?  Why,  marriage "  He  stopped.  A 

faint  color  flared  in  his  cheeks.  He  looked  away  from 
her.  Then  he  said  calmly:  "Marriage,  Nat,  is  just 
mating — like  birds  mate.  First  you  see  them  flying 
about  anyhow;  then  two  fly  together.  They  build  a 
nest ;  they  mate ;  they  have  little  birds.  The  little  birds 
grow  up  and  do  the  whole  thing  over  again.  That  's — 
that  's  marriage." 

"So?"  said  Natalie.  A  little  frown  came  to  her 
brows.  Was  that  marriage,  indeed  ?  Then  she  shook 
the  frown  from  her.  "Lew,"  she  said  gravely,  but  plac- 
idly, "they  tell  me  I  'm  to  marry  Dom  Francisco.  Is  n't 
it — is  n't  it  funny?" 

Lewis  stopped  in  his  tracks  and  shook  her  hand  from 
his  arm.  His  eyes  flared. 

"What  did  you  say  ?    They  tell  you — who  told  you  ?" 

"Why,  Lew!"  cried  Natalie,  tears  in  her  eyes  and 
her  lips  twitching. 

"There,  there,  Nat,"  said  Lewis,  softly.  He  laid  his 
arm  across  her  shoulders  in  an  awkward  gesture  of  af- 
fection. "Tell  me,  Nat.  Who  was  it  told  you — told 
you  that  ?" 

"Father,"  sobbed  Natalie. 


42      THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Before  she  knew  what  he  was  doing,  Lew  had  leaped 
upon  her  pony  and  was  off  at  a  gallop. 

"Lew!"  cried  Natalie,  "Lew!  Shall  I  bring  in  the 
goats  ?" 

He  did  not  heed  her. 


CHAPTER   IX 

LEWIS  stopped  at  Nadir  only  long  enough  to  learn 
that  the  Reverend  Orme  had  remained  at  the 
school-house  as  had  been  his  wont  of  late.  He  found 
him  there,  idle,  sitting  at  the  rough  table  that  served  as 
his  desk,  and  brooding.  Lewis  walked  half  the  length 
of  the  room  before  Leighton  saw  him. 

"What  are  you  doing  here  ?" 

"What  have  you  been  telling  Nat  ?" 

The  questions  were  almost  simultaneous. 

"What  have  I  been  telling  Natalie?"  repeated  the 
Reverend  Orme.  "Well,  what  have  I  been  telling  her  ?" 

Lewis  fixed  his  eyes  on  Leighton's  face. 

"Are  you  really  going  to  marry  Nat  to  that — to  that 
old  man?" 

The  Reverend  Orme  shifted  in  his  chair. 

"Lewis,"  he  said,  "I  do  n't  know  that  it 's  any  of  your 
business,  but  it  is  probable  that  Natalie  will  marry  Dom 
Francisco." 

Lewis  moved  awkwardly  from  one  foot  to  the  other, 
but  his  eyes  never  shifted. 

"Does  Mother — Mrs.  Leighton  know  about  thisi 
Does  mammy  ?  Do  they  agree  ?" 

43 


44      THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

f- 
"Young  man,"   answered  Leighton,   angrily,   "they 

know  that,  as  this  world  goes,  Natalie  is  a  lucky  girl. 
Dom  Francisco  is  the  wealthiest  man  in  the  province. 
Look  around  you,  sir.  Whom  would  you  have  her  marry 
if  not  Dom  Francisco  ?  Some  pauper,  I  suppose.  Some 
foundling." 

Lewis's  cheeks  burned  red. 

"You  need  not  go  so  far  as  to  marry  her  to  a  found- 
ling," he  answered,  "but  you  might  be  kinder  to  her 
than  to  marry  her  to — to  that  old  man.  You  might 
choke  her  to  death." 

The  Reverend  Orme  leaped  from  his  chair. 

"Choke  her  to  death,  you — you  interloper!"  He 
strode  toward  Lewis,  his  trembling  hands  held  before 
him. 

"Hold  on!"  cried  Lewis,  his  eyes  flaming.  "I  'm  no 
drunkard — no  cowardly  Manoel." 

The  Reverend  Orme  stopped  in  his  stride.  A  ghastly 
pallor  came  over  his  face. 

"Manoel !"  he  whispered.  "What  do  you  know  about 
Manoel?" 

Lewis's  heart  sank  low  within  him.  His  unbroken 
silence  of  years  had  been  instinctive.  Now,  when  it 
was  too  late,  he  suddenly  realized  that  it  had  been  the 
thread  that  held  him  to  Nadir.  He  had  broken  it. 
Never  more  could  he  and  the  Reverend  Orme  sleep  be- 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS      45 

neath  the  same  roof,  eat  at  the  same  table.  He  saw  it 
in  the  Reverend  Orme's  face. 

Leighton  had  staggered  back  to  his  chair  and  sat  star- 
ing vacantly  at  the  floor.  Lewis  looked  at  his  head, 
streaked  with  white,  at  his  brow,  terribly  lined,  and  at 
his  vacant,  staring  eyes.  He  felt  a  sudden  great  pity 
for  his  foster-father,  but  pity  had  come  too  late. 

"Sir,"  he  said,  "I  am  going  away.  I  shall  need  some 
money."  He  felt  no  shame  at  asking  for  money.  For 
seven  years  he  had  tended  Leighton's  goats — tended 
them  so  well  that  in  seven  years  they  had  increased 
sevenfold. 

Leighton  unlocked  the  drawer  of  his  table  and  took 
out  a  small  roll  of  bank-notes.  He  tossed  it  on  the  table. 
Lewis  picked  out  two  notes  from  the  roll,  and  pushed 
the  rest  back.  He  started  toward  the  door.  Half-way 
he  paused  and  turned  to  his  foster-father. 

"Good-by,  sir.  I  'm  sorry  I  let  you  know  that — that 
I  knew." 

Leighton  did  not  look  up. 

"Good-by,  Lewis,"  he  said  quietly. 

Lewis  hurried  to  his  little  room.  He  took  out  all  his 
boyish  treasures  and  laid  them  on  the  bed.  How  silly 
they  looked,  how  childish !  He  swept  them  away,  and 
spread  a  large  red  handkerchief  in  their  place.  He 
heard  Natalie  come  in  and  call  for  him,  but  he  did  not 
answer.  In  the  handkerchief  he  packed  his  scanty 


wardrobe.  As  he  knotted  the  corners  together  he  heard 
Mrs.  Leighton  and  mammy  chatting  lightly  with  Na- 
talie, helping  her  to  dress. 

Lewis,  heavy-hearted,  looked  about  his  ugly  little 
room,  so  bare,  but  as  friendly  as  a  plain  face  endeared 
by  years  of  kindness.  From  among  his  discarded  treas- 
ures he  chose  the  model  in  clay  of  a  kid,  jumping,  the 
best  he  had  ever  made.  He  tucked  it  into  his  bundle ; 
then  he  picked  up  the  bundle,  and  walked  out  into  the 
great  room,  kitchen,  sitting-  and  dining-room  combined. 

Mrs.  Leighton  and  mammy  were  seated  at  the  table. 
Beside  them  stood  Natalie.  They  turned  and  looked  at 
Lewis,  surprised.  Lewis  stared  at  Natalie.  She  wore  a 
dress  he  had  seen  but  twice  before  and  then  on  great 
occasions.  It  had  been  a  birthday  present  from  her 
parents.  It  was  a  red,  pleated  dress  Accordion  silk, 
the  women  called  it. 

About  Natalie's  shoulders  was  a  white,  filmy  scarf. 
For  the  first  time  in  her  life  her  hair  was  loosely  piled 
upon  her  head.  Through  it  and  over  it  ran  a  bright 
ribbon.  The  gloss  of  the  satin  ribbon  was  as  naught 
beside  the  gloss  of  her  shining  hair.  Her  neck,  and  her 
arms  from  the  elbows,  were  bare.  Her  neck  was  very 
thin.  One  could  almost  see  the  bones. 

"Where  are  you  going,  Lewis  ?"  said  Mrs.  Leighton, 
listlessly. 


THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      47 

Lewis  felt  the  tears  rise  to  his  eyes.  He  was  ashamed 
of  them. 

"Do  not  speak  to  me,"  he  said  roughly.  "You  are  a 
wicked  woman.  You  have  sold  Natalie."  Then  he 
turned  fiercely  on  mammy.  "And  you,"  he  said — "you 
have  dressed  her  for  the  market.  You  are  a  bad  jiig- 
ger." 

Mrs.  Leighton  gasped  and  then  began  to  cry  softly. 
Mammy's  eyes  stared  at  Lewis. 

"Bad  niggah,  young  Marster  ?"  she  mumbled  vaguely. 

Natalie  grasped  the  table  and  leaned  forward. 
"Lew!"  she  cried.  "Why,  Lew!" 

Lewis  struck  a  tear  from  his  cheek,  turned,  and  fled. 
He  went  to  the  rough  lean-to  that  served  as  a  stable  and 
began  to  saddle  his  pony. 

In  all  the  heavens  there  was  not  a  cloud.  It  was  what 
the  natives,  too  often  scourged  by  drought,  called  an 
ugly  night.  The  full  moon  rose  visibly  into  the  pale 
bowl  of  blue.  Above  her  tropic  glare  the  satellite  stars 
shone  wanly  and  far  away. 

As  Lewis  was  about  to  mount,  Natalie  came  running 
from  the  house.  She  held  her  new  dress  above  her 
knees.  Her  white  scarf  streamed  out  like  two  wings 
behind  her. 

"Lew!"  she  called.     "Wait!    What  are  you  doing?" 

Lewis  waited  for  her.  She  came  close  to  him  and 
laid  her  hand  upon  his  arm.  Her  brown  eyes,  shot  with 


48       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

gold,  were  bigger  than  ever.  They  looked  their  question 
into  his  face. 

"Nat,"  he  said,  "I  Ve  quarreled  with  your  dad. 
There  's  nothing  to  talk  about.  I  must  go." 

"Go,  Lew?     Go  where?" 

Lewis  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"I  do  n't  know,"  he  said.     "Just  go." 

Natalie  laid  her  head  against  him.  Her  two  hands 
gripped  his  shoulders.  She  sobbed  as  though  her  heart 
would  break.  Lewis  put  his  arm  about  her.  He  felt 
the  twitching  bones  of  her  thin,  warm  body.  His  face 
was  in  her  hair. 

"Ah,  Natalie,"  he  murmured,  brokenly,  "do  n't  cry ! 
do  n't  cry !" 

They  were  children.    They  did  not  think  to  kiss. 


CHAPTER   X 

LEWIS  traveled  toward  the  ancient  town  of  Oeiras. 
He  had  cast  about  in  his  mind  for  some  means  of 
livelihood  and  had  decided  to  become  a  goatskin-buyer. 
He  was  hoping  to  come  to  an  arrangement  with  some 
merchant  in  Oeiras. 

One  morning  as  he  jogged  along,  his  eyes  on  the 
ground,  his  thoughts  far  away,  he  heard  the  patter  of 
many  hoofs  on  the  hard  clay  trail.  A  pack-train  was 
coming  toward  him.  At  its  head  rode  a  guide.  The 
guide  stopped  upon  meeting  Lewis,  and  immediately 
every  mule  behind  him  stopped,  too. 

"The  blessing  of  God  be  upon  you,  friend!"  he 
drawled.  "Whence  do  you  come  and  whither  do  you 
go?" 

"God's  blessing  be  praised,"  answered  Lewis.  "I 
come  from  the  hills.  I  go  to  Oeiras." 

"To  Oeiras?  We  come  thence.  It  is  a  long  road, 
Oeiras." 

"I  go  to  seek  a  merchant  who  will  start  me  as  a  goat- 
skin-buyer. Do  you  know  of  any  such  ?" 

"A  goatskin-buyer  ?  Friend,  for  almost  every  goat 
there  is  a  goatskin-buyer.  My  brother  is  one,  my  father- 

49 


50      THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

in-law  another.  I  myself  shall  become  one  after  this 
trip  is  over.  You  would  do  well  to  choose  some  other 
occupation." 

Lewis  did  not  smile  at  the  man's  guile,  though  it  had 
not  escaped  him.  He  was  gazing  open-mouthed  at  a 
horseman  who  was  forcing  his  way  past  the  laden  mules. 
From  some  distance  the  horseman  yelled  in  English : 

"What  the  devil  's  the  matter  now?  Ye  gods  and 
little  fishes !  what  are  you  stopping  for  now  ?" 

The  guide  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  tapped  his 
head. 

"Mad,"  he  said;  "an  idiot.  Imagine!  He  thinks 
those  are  words !" 

.TLe  horseman  drew  up  beside  them,  wrath  in  his 
face. 

"Sir,"  said  Lewis,  "your  guide  stopped  to  greet  me. 
It  is  the  custom  of  the  country." 

Lewis  and  Natalie  spoke  English  with  the  precision 
of  the  adults  from  whom  they  had  learned  it.  They 
had  never  heard  the  argot  of  American  childhood,  but 
from  mammy  and  from  the  tongue  of  their  adopted  land 
they  had  acquired  a  soft  slurring  of  speech  which  gave 
a  certain  quaintness  to  their  diction. 

It  was  the  turn  of  the  stranger  to  stare  open-mouthed. 
Lewis  wore  the  uniform  of  the  local  cow-boy:  a  thick, 
wide-brimmed  leather  hat,  fastened  under  the  chin  with 
a  thong;  a  loose  deerskin  jumper  and  deerskin  breeches 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      51 

that  fitted  tightly  to  the  leg  and  ended  in  a  long  flap 
over  the  instep.  On  his  feet  were  sandals  and  gro- 
tesque, handwrought  spurs.  His  red  bundle  was  tied 
to  the  cantle  of  his  saddle.  At  hearing  precise  English 
from  such  a  source,  the  stranger  felt  an  astonishment 
almost  equal  to  Balaam's  surprise  on  hearing  his  ass 
speak. 

No  less  was  Lewis's  wonder  at  the  stranger's  raiment. 
A  pith  helmet,  Norfolk  jacket,  moleskin  riding-breeches, 
leather  puttees,  and  stout,  pigskin  footwear — these  were 
strange  apparel. 

The  stranger  was  not  old.  One  would  have  placed 
him  at  forty-five.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  was  only 
forty.  He  was  the  first  to  recover  poise.  He  peered 
keenly  into  Lewis's  face. 

"May  I  ask  your  name  ?" 

"My  name  is  Lewis  Leighton.     And  yours?" 

The  stranger  waved  his  hand  impatiently. 

"Where  are  you  going  ?" 

"I  am  on  my  way  to  Oeiras  to  seek  employment," 
said  Lewis. 

"To  seek  employment,  eh?"  said  the  stranger, 
thoughtfully.  "Will  you  tell  this  misbegotten  guide 
that  I  wish  to  return  to  the  water  we  passed  a  little 
while  ago  ?  I  should  like  to  talk  to  you,  if  you  do  n't 
mind." 

Lewis  translated  the  order. 


52      THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

"So  they  are  words,  after  all,"  said  the  guide.  He 
shook  his  head  from  side  to  side,  as  one  who  suspects 
witchcraft. 

When  the  pack-train  was  headed  back  on  the  road  it 
had  come,  Lewis  turned  to  the  guide. 

"Whither  was  your  master  bound  ?"  he  asked. 

"Him  ?"  said  the  guide,  with  a  shrug  of  his  shoulder. 
"Who  knows  ?  ~No  sooner  does  he  reach  one  town  than 
he  's  off  for  another.  It  is  his  life,  the  madman,  to  bore 
a  hole  through  this  world  of  Christ.  Just  now  we 
were  headed  for  the  ranch  of  Dom  Francisco.  After 
that,  who  knows?  But  he  pays,  friend.  Gold  oozes 
from  him  like  matter  from  a  sore." 

They  came  to  a  spring.  The  stranger  ordered  up  the 
fly  of  a  tent.  From  his  baggage  he  took  two  wonderful 
folding-chairs  and  a  folding-table,  opened  them,  and 
placed  them  under  the  fly.  "Sit  down,"  he  said  to 
Lewis. 

The  stranger  took  off  his  helmet  and  tossed  it  on  the 
ground.  Lewis  pulled  off  his  hat  hurriedly  and  laid  it 
aside.  The  stranger  looked  at  him  long  and  earnestly. 

"Are  you  hungry  ?" 

Lewis  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"One  can  always  eat,"  he  said. 

"Good,"  said  the  stranger.  "Please  tell  these  loafers 
to  off-load  the  mules  and  set  camp.  And  call  that  one 
here — the  black  fellow  with  a  necklace  of  chickens." 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS      53 

Lewis  did  as  he  was  bidden.  The  man  with  the 
chickens  stood  before  the  stranger  and  grinned. 

The  stranger  raised  his  eyes  on  high. 

"Ah,  God,"  he  said,  "I  give  Thee  thanks  tha\;  at  last 
I  can  talk  to  this  low-browed,  brutal  son  of  a  degenerate 
race  of  cooks."  He  turned  to  Lewis.  "Tell  him,"  he 
continued — "tell  him  that  I  never  want  to  see  anything 
boiled  again  unless  it  's  his  live  carcass  boiling  in  oil. 
Tell  him  that  I  hate  the  smell,  the  sight,  and  the  sound 
of  garlic.  Tell  him  that  jerked  beef  is  a  fitting  sus- 
tenance for  maggots,  but  not  for  hungering  man.  Tell 
him  there  is  a  place  in  the  culinary  art  for  red  peppers, 
but  not  by  the  handful.  Tell  him,  may  he  burn  here- 
after as  I  have  burned  within  and  lap  up  with  joy  the 
tears  that  I  have  shed  in  pain.  Tell  him — tell  him 
that." 

For  the  first  time  in  the  presence  of  the  stranger 
Lewis  smiled.  His  smile  was  rare  and,  as  is  often  the 
case  with  a  rare  smile,  it  held  accumulated  charm. 

"Sir,"  he  said,  "let  me  cook  a  meal  for  you." 

While  Lewis  cooked,  the  stranger  laid  the  table  for 
two.  In  less  than  an  hour  the  meal  was  ready.  A  young 
fowl,  spitchcocked,  nestled  in  a  snowy  bed  of  rice,  each 
grain  of  which  was  a  world  unto  itself.  The  fowl  was 
basted  with  the  sovereign  gravy  of  the  South;  thick, 
but  beaten  smooth,  dusted  with  pepper  and  salt,  breath- 
ing an  essence  of  pork.  Beside  the  laden  platter  was  a 


54:      THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

plate  of  crisp  bread — bread  that  had  been  soaked  into 
freshness  in  a  wet  cloth  and  then  toasted  lightly.  Be- 
side the  bread  lay  a  pat  of  "fresh  butter  on  a  saucer.  It 
was  butter  from  the  tin,  but  washed  white  in  the  cool 
water  of  the  spring,  and  then  sprinkled  with  salt. 

The  stranger  nodded  approval  as  he  started  to  eat. 

"A  simple  meal,  my  accomplished  friend,"  he  said  to 
Lewis,  "but  I  know  the  mouths  of  the  gods  are  water- 

ing." 

When  nothing  was  left  of  the  food,  the  stranger, 
through  Lewis,  ordered  the  table  cleared,  then  he  turned 
to  his  guest. 

"You  have  already  had  occasion  to  see  how  useful  you 
would  be  to  me,"  he  said.  "I  propose  that  you  seek  em- 
ployment no  further.  Join  me  not  as  cook,  but  as 
interpreter,  companion,  friend  in  very  present  trouble. 
I  will  pay  you  a  living  wage." 

Lewis's  eyes  lighted  up.  What  wage  should  he  de- 
mand for  accompanying  this  strange  man,  who  drew 
him  as  Lewis  himself  drew  shy,  wild  creatures  to  his 
knee?  No  wage.  No  wage  but  service.  "I  will  go 
with  you,"  he  said. 

"Good!"  said  the  stranger.  "Now — where  shall  we 
go?" 

"Where  shall  we  go  ?"  repeated  Lewis,  puzzled. 

"Tea.    Where  shall  we  go  ?" 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       55 

"That  is  for  you  to  say/'  said  Lewis,  gravely,  fearing 
a  joke. 

"Not  at  all/'  said  the  stranger.  "To  me  it  is  a  mat- 
ter of  complete  indifference.  Of  all  the  spots  on  the 
face  of  the  earth,  this  is  the  last ;  no  game,  no  water,  no 
scenery,  no  women,  no  food.  And  having  seen  the  last 
spot  on  earth,  direction  no  longer  interests  me.  What 
would  you  like  to  see  ?" 

Lewis  felt  himself  inside  a  book  of  fairy-tales. 

"I  ?"  he  said,  smiling  shyly.  "I  should  like  to  see  the 
sea  again." 

"Right  you  are !"  said  the  stranger.  "Tell  the  guide 
to  start  for  the  sea." 


\ 


JL 


CHAPTEE   XI 


stranger  was  accompanied  by  two  muleteers, 
a  cook,  a  wash-boy,  and  the  guide.  !N"ot  one  of 
these  was  a  menial,  for  menials  do  not  breed  in  open 
country.  When  the  stranger  shouted  for  one  of  them, 
they  all  gathered  round  him  and  stood  at  ease,  smiling 
at  his  gestures,  guessing  genially  at  what  he  was  trying 
to  say,  and  in  the  end  calmly  doing  things  their  own 
way. 

When  Lewis  called  the  guide,  they  all  came,  as  waa 
their  custom. 

"Your  master,"  said  Lewis  to  the  guide,  "wishes  to 
go  to  the  sea.  He  bids  you  start  for  the  sea." 

The  guide  stared  at  Lewis,  then  at  the  stranger. 

"The  sea  !    What  is  the  sea  ?" 

"The  sea,"  said  Lewis,  gravely,  "is  the  ocean,  the 
great  water  where  ships  sail." 

"Bah  !"  said  the  guide.  "More  madness.  How  shall 
I  guide  him  to  the  sea  if  I  know  not  where  it  is  ?  Tell 
him  there  is  no  sea." 

One  of  the  muleteers  broke  in. 

"Indeed,  there  is  a  sea,  but  it  is  far,  far  away.  It  is 
thirty  days  away." 

56 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      57 

"And  how  do  you  go  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

"I  do  not  know.  I  only  know  that  one  must  go  to 
Joazeiro,  and  from  there  they  say  there  is  a  road  of 
iron  that  leads  one  to  the  sea." 

"Joazeiro !"  exclaimed  the  guide.  "Ah,  that  is  some 
sense.  Joazeiro  is  a  place.  It  is  on  the  river.  Petro- 
lina  is  on  this  side,  Joazeiro  on  that.  As  for  this  road 
of  iron,  bah!"  He  turned  on  the  muleteer.  "Thou, 
too,  art  mad." 

The  stranger  listened  to  what  Lewis  had  to  say,  then 
he  drew  out  a  map  from  his  pocket,  unfolded  it,  and 
spread  it  on  the  table.  "A  road  of  iron,  eh  ?  Well,  let 's 
see." 

The  guide  grinned  at  Lewis. 

"It  is  a  picture  of  the  world,"  he  said.  "He  stares 
at  it  daily." 

"Yes,"  said  the  stranger,  "here  we  are — Joazeiro." 

Lewis  leaned  over  his  shoulder.  He  saw  the  word 
"Joazeiro."  From  it  a  straight  red  line  ran  eastward 
to  the  edge  of  the  map. 

The  stranger  measured  distances  with  a  pencil.  "We 
can  make  Joazeiro  in  fifteen  days,"  he  said.  "Tell  the 
men  we  will  rest  to-day  and  to-night.  To-morrow  we 
start." 

The  marvels  of  that  camp  were  a  revelation  to  Lewis. 
He  kept  his  mouth  shut,  but  his  eyes  were  open.  One 


58       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

battered  thing  after  another  revealed  its  mystery  to  him. 
He  turned  to  the  stranger. 

"You  are  a  great  traveler/'  he  said. 

The  stranger  started.    He  had  been  day-dreaming. 

"A  great  traveler  ?  Yes.  I  have  been  a  wanderer  on 
all  the  faces  of  the  earth.  I  have  lived  seven  lives.  I  '11 
give  them  to  you,  if  you  like." 

Lewis  smiled,  puzzled,  but  somehow  pleased. 

"Give  them  to  me — your  seven  lives  ?" 

The  stranger  did  not  answer.  Gloom  had  settled  on 
the  face  that  Lewis  had  seen  only  alight.  Lewis,  too, 
was  silent.  His  life  with  Ann  and  the  Reverend  Orme 
had  taught  him  much.  He  recognized  the  dwelling- 
place  of  sorrow. 

Presently  the  stranger  shook  his  mood  from  him. 

"Come,"  he  said,  "let  us  begin."  From  one  of  his 
bags  he  took  a  pack  of  cards.  He  sat  at  the  table  and 
shuffled  them.  "There  are  many  games  of  patience," 
he  continued.  "They  are  all  founded  on  averages  and 
thousands  of  combinations,  so  intricate  that  the  law  of 
recurrence  can  be  determined  only  by  months  of  figur- 
ing. However,  one  can  learn  a  patience  without  bother- 
ing with  the  law  of  recurrence.  I  shall  now  teach  you  a 
game  called  Canfield." 

Time  after  time  the  cards  were  laid  out,  played,  and 
reshuffled. 


THROUGH   STAINED   GLASS      59 

"Now,"  said  the  stranger,  "do  you  think  you  know 
the  game  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  "I  think  so." 

He  played,  with  some  success. 

"You  have  got  out  fourteen  cards,"  said  the  stranger. 
"You  have  beaten  the  game." 

"How  can  that  be  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

"It  can  be,"  said  the  stranger,  "because  this  is  one  of 
the  few  games  of  patience  that  has  been  reduced  to  a 
scientific  gambling  basis.  The  odds,  allowing  for  the 
usual  advantage  to  the  banker,  have  been  determined 
at  five  to  one.  Say  I  'm  the  banker.  I  sell  you  the  pack 
for  fifty-two  pennies,  and  I  pay  you  five  pennies  for 
every  card  you  get  out.  Five  to  one.  Do  you  see  that  ?" 

Lewis  nodded. 

"Well,"  said  the  stranger.  "You  got  out  fourteen 
cards.  If  you  had  paid  a  penny  a  card  for  the  pack, 
how  much  would  you  have  gained  over  what  you 
spent  ?" 

"Eighteen  pennies,"  said  Lewis,  after  a  moment.  "If 
I  had  got  them  all  out,"  he  added,  "it  would  have  been 
two  hundred  and  eight  pennies." 

"Eight!"  said  the  stranger.  "You  have  a  head  for 
figures.  Now,  have  you  any  money  ?" 

Lewis  colored  slightly. 

"Yes,"  he  said.  He  fished  out  his  two  bank-notes  and 
laid  them  on  the  table. 


60       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 


The  stranger  picked  them  up. 

"All  right,"  he  said.  "I  '11  sell  you  the  pack  for  one 
of  these.  Now,  go  ahead." 

All  afternoon  Lewis  played  against  the  bank  with 
varying  fortune.  When  he  was  ahead,  some  instinct 
made  him  ashamed  to  call  off;  when  he  was  behind,  a 
fever  seized  him — a  fever  to  hold  his  own,  to  win.  His 
eyes  began  to  ache.  Toward  evening  three  successive 
bad  hands  suddenly  wiped  out  his  store  of  money.  A 
feeling  of  despair  came  over  him. 

"Do  n't  worry,"  said  the  stranger.  He  pushed  the 
two  notes  and  another  toward  Lewis.  "I  '11  give  you 
those  for  your  pony.  Now,  at  it  you  go.  Win  him 
back." 

Lewis  played  feverishly.  In  an  hour  he  had  lost  the 
three  notes. 

"Never  mind,"  said  the  stranger ;  "I  '11  give  you  an- 
other chance."  He  pushed  one  of  the  notes  toward 
Lewis.  "That  for  your  bundle  in  the  red  handkerchief. 
You  may  win  the  whole  lot  back  in  one  hand." 

Lewis  played  and  lost.  Despair  seized  upon  him  now 
with  no  uncertain  hand.  His  money,  his  pony,  even  his 
little  bundle  gone!  This  was  calamity.  He  suffered 
as  only  the  young  can  suffer.  His  world  had  suddenly 
become  a  blank.  Through  bloodshot  eyes  he  looked  upon 
the  stranger  and  tried  to  hate  him,  but  could  not. 

"Come,"  said  the  stranger,  rising  and  lighting  a  Ian- 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS       61 

tern.  "I  'm  going  to  make  you  a  foolish  offer  of  big 
odds  against  me.  I  '11  wager  all  I  've  won  from  you 
against  one  year's  service  that  you  can  't  beat  the  game 
in  one  hand.  Eleven  cards  out  of  the  fifty-two  beats  the 
game." 

What  was  a  year's  service?  thought  Lewis.  He  had 
been  willing  to  give  that  for  nothing.  He  played  and 
lost.  Suddenly  shame  was  added  to  his  despair.  To 
give  service  is  noble,  but  to  have  it  bought  from  you, 
won  from  you!  Lewis  fought  back  his  tears  desper- 
ately. What  a  fool,  what  a  fool  this  man,  this  stranger, 
had  made  of  him ! 

The  stranger  took  out  his  watch  and  looked  at  it. 

"In  seven  hours  and  seven  minutes,"  he  remarked, 
"I  have  given  you  one  of  my  seven  lives  that  it  took 
almost  seven  years  to  live.  Seven,  by  the  way,  is  one 
of  the  mystic  numbers." 

At  his  first  words  Lewis  felt  a  wave  of  relief — the 
relief  of  the  diver  in  deep  waters  who  feels  himself 
rising  to  the  surface.  Perhaps  all  was  not  lost.  Per- 
haps this  man  could  restore  their  imperiled  friendship, 
so  sudden,  already  so  dear. 

The  stranger  went  on : 

"Ashamed  to  stop  when  you  're  ahead,  too  keen  to 
stop  when  you  're  behind,  you  've  lost  all  you  possessed, 
jarred  your  trust  in  your  fellow-man,  and  bartered  free- 
dom for  slavery — mortgaged  a  year  of  your  life.  You  've 


climbed  the  cliff  of  greed,  got  one  whiff  of  sordid  elation 
at  the  top,  and  tumbled  down  the  precipice  of  despair. 
In  short,  you  've  lived  the  whole  life  of  a  gambler — all 
in  seven  hours." 

He  picked  up  Lewis's  two  notes  and  stuffed  them  into 
his  own  well-filled  wallet.  "They  say,"  he  continued, 
"that  only  experience  teaches.  You  may  gamble  all  the 
rest  of  your  life,  but  take  it  from  me,  my  friend,  gam- 
bling holds  no  emotion  you  have  n't  gone  through  to- 
day." 

Their  eyes  met.  Lewis's  gaze  was  puzzled,  but  intent. 
The  stranger's  eyes  were  almost  twinkling. 

"By  the  way,"  he  said,  "what 's  in  the  bundle  ?  Let  's 
see." 

Lewis  brought  his  sorry  little  bundle  and  laid  it  on 
the  table.  He  untied  the  knots  with  trembling  fingers. 
The  stranger  poked  around  the  contents  with  his  finger. 
He  picked  out  the  little  kid  of  clay,  already  minus  a  leg. 

"Hallo!     What  's  this?" 

"A  toy,"  said  Lewis,  coloring. 

"Who  made  it  ?" 

"I  did." 

"You  did,  eh?  Well,  I  '11  keep  it."  The  stranger 
fingered  around  until  he  found  the  missing  leg.  "You 
can  take  the  rest  of  your  things  away.  I  '11  lend  'em  to 
you,  and  your  pony.  Now  let  's  eat." 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      63 

That  night  Lewis,  too  excited  to  sleep,  lay  awake  for 
hours  smiling  at  the  moon.  He  was  smiling  because  he 
felt  that  somehow,  out  of  the  wreck,  friendship  had  been 
saved. 


CHAPTEK   XII 

THE  country  through  which  they  traveled  was  fa- 
miliar to  Lewis,  tedious  to  the  stranger.  Sand, 
sparse  grass,  and  thorn-trees ;  thorn-trees  and  sand,  was 
their  daily  portion.  The  sun  beat  down  and  up.  They 
traveled  long  hours  by  night,  less  and  less  by  day.  They 
talked  little,  for  night  has  a  way  of  sealing  the  lips  of 
those  who  journey  under  her  wing. 

Water  was  scarce.  The  day  before  that  on  which 
they  hoped  to  make  the  river,  a  forced  march  brought 
them  to  a  certain  water-hole.  The  stranger,  Lewis,  and 
the  guide  arrived  at  it  far  ahead  of  the  pack-train.  The 
water-hole  was  dry.  They  were  thirsty.  They  pushed 
on  to  a  little  mud  house  a  short  way  off  the  trail.  The 
stranger  looked  up  as  they  approached  it. 

"Do  you  think  it  will  stand  till  we  get  there  ?"  he 
asked. 

Lewis  smiled.  The  house  was  feaning  in  three  direc- 
tions. The  weight  of  its  tiled  roof  threatened  at  any 
moment  to  crush  the  long-suffering  walls  to  the  ground. 
At  one  corner  stood  a  great  earthen  jar,  and  beside  the 
jar  an  old  hag.  She  held  a  gourd  to  her  lips.  On  some 
straw  in  the  shade  of  the  eaves  was  a  setting  hen. 

64 


THEOUGH   STAINED   GLASS      65 

"Auntie,"  called  Lewis,  "we  thirst.    Give  us  water." 

The  old  woman  turned  and  stared  at  them.  Her  face, 
all  but  her  eyes,  was  as  dilapidated  as  her  house.  Her 
black  eyes,  brilliant  and  piercing,  shone  out  of  the  ruin. 

"I  have  no  water  for  thee  to  drink,  my  pretty  son," 
she  answered. 

"Shameless  one!"  cried  Lewis.  "Dost  thou  drink 
thyself  and  deny  the  traveler  ?" 

"Eh,  eh!"  cackled  the  old  woman.  "Thou  wouldst 
share  my  gourd  ?  Then  drink,  for  thy  tongue  is  not  so 
pretty  as  thy  face."  She  held  up  the  gourd  to  Lewis 
in  both  her  hands.  He  took  it  from  her  and  passed  it 
to  the  stranger. 

The  stranger  made  a  grimace,  but  sipped  the  water. 
Then  he  flung  gourd  and  water  to  the  ground  with 
half  an  oath. 

"Bah !"  he  said  to  Lewis.    "It  is  salt." 

"Salt!"  cried  Lewis.  "But  she  drank  of  it.  I  saw 
her  drink." 

"Yes,"  said  the  stranger;  "she  's  got  an  alkalified 
stomach.  Let  those  who  hanker  after  immortality  look 
upon  this  woman.  She  will  never  die." 

The  old  hag  laughed. 

"Ah,  shameless  one,  eh  ?"  she  mumbled.  "  'Tis  the 
young  one  should  have  tasted,  but  no  matter,  for  the  son 
is  the  spit  of  the  father." 


66       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Auntie,"  said  Lewis,  smiling,  "give  us  of  thy 
shade." 

"Willingly,  my  pretty  son,  for  thou  hast  smiled." 

They  dismounted.  The  stranger  and  Lewis  entered 
the  house. 

"Here,"  cried  the  old  woman,  "sit  here ;  for  when  the 
house  falls,  the  weight  will  go  yonder." 

Lewis  explained  to  the  stranger.  He  glanced  at  the 
old  woman. 

"Old  Immortality  has  brains,"  he  said.  "Might  have 
known  it,  with  those  eyes." 

They  sat  on  the  floor  of  beaten  earth.  The  old  woman 
went  out.  Through  the  gaps  in  the  walls  Lewis  saw  her 
build  a  fire  and  put  a  pot  of  the  "Brackish  water  on  to 
boil.  Then  he  saw  her  drag  the  setting  hen  from  her 
nest  and  wring  its  neck.  He  jumped  up  and  rushed 
out. 

"What  are  you  doing?"  he  cried.  "Why  kill  a  set- 
ting hen  ?" 

"Aye,"  said  the  old  woman,  "it  is  a  pity,  for  she  is 
the  last  chicken  in  the  world." 

Lewis  and  the  stranger  were  hungry.  Night  was 
falling.  There  was  no  sign  of  their  belated  pack-train. 
When  boiling  had  done  its  utmost,  they  ate  the  last 
chicken  on  earth.  Before  they  had  finished,  a  child, 
pitifully  thin,  came  in,  bearing  on  her  head  a  small  jar 
of  water. 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      67 

"Now  drink,"  said  the  old  woman,  "for  this  water 
came  from  the  river,  twelve  miles  away." 

They  drank,  then  the  stranger  set  his  helmet  on  the 
floor  for  a  pillow,  laid  his  head  upon  it,  and  slept. 
Lewis  sat  beside  him.  The  child  had  curled  up  in  a 
corner.  The  guide  was  snoring  outside.  In  the  door- 
way the  old  woman  crouched  and  crooned. 

Presently  she  turned  and  peered  into  the  house.  She 
beckoned  to  Lewis.  He  rose  and  followed  her.  She  led 
him  around  the  house,  through  a  thicket  of  thorn-trees, 
and  up  the  slope  of  a  small  sand-dune.  Toward  the  west 
sand-dunes  rose  and  fell  in  monotonous  succession. 

At  the  top  of  the  dune  the  old  woman  crouched  on  her 
heels  and  motioned  to  Lewis  to  sit. 

"My  son,"  she  said,  "thou  hast  taken  my  carcass  for 
the  common  clay  of  these  parts.  I  cannot  blame  thee, 
but  had  I  the  water  to  wash  this  cursed  dust  from  my 
face  and  hands,  I  would  show  thee  a  skin  that  was 
stained  at  birth  with  the  olive  and  veins  whose  blood 
flows  unmixed  through  generations  without  end.  These 
wrinkled  feet  have  flattened  the  face  of  the  earth  bit 
by  bit.  Bear  witness  those  who  left  me  here  behind  to 
die !  My  eyes  have  looked  upon  things  seen  and  unseen. 
I  am  old.  To  youth  is  given  folly;  to  the  old,  wisdom. 
To-night  my  wisdom  shall  suckle  thy  folly,  for  the 
heavens  have  shown  me  a  sign." 

Lewis  stared  at  the  old  woman  with  wondering  eyes. 


68       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

He  had  never  seen  a  Gipsy.  What  was  she?  he  asked 
himself.  No  native.  The  native's  mind  was  keen  with 
knowledge  of  horses,  cattle,  and  goats,  but  stolid,  almost 
stupid,  when  it  came  to  words  and  thoughts.  There 
was  an  exception — the  mad.  The  mad  prattled  and 
sometimes  said  extraordinary  things.  Perhaps  this 
woman  was  mad.  He  turned  half  toward  her. 

"Look  up,"  she  commanded.  "Dost  thou  see  no 
sign?" 

Lewis  lay  on  his  back  and  gazed  into  the  sky.  "I  see 
the  moon  and  the  stars,  Auntie — a  young  moon  and  very 
old  stars — but  no  sign.  Not  even  a  cloud  to  remind  the 
world  of  rain." 

The  old  woman  leaned  forward  and  touched  his  arm. 
He  started. 

"Look  over  there!"  She  pointed  to  the  west  and 
south.  "See  how  the  young  moon  is  held  within  the 
claws  of  Scorpion.  His  back  is  arched  across  the  quar- 
ter. His  tail  points  to  the  south.  The  Cross  that  some 
call  Holy  hangs  like  a  pendent  upon  its  tip.  Look  up. 
Upon  his  arched  back  he  bears  the  circlet — the  seven 
worlds  of  women." 

"I  see  the  Scorpion,  Auntie,"  said  Lewis,  humoring 
her.  "I  see  the  circlet  too,  but  it  is  far  above  his  back. 
It  is  like  a  crown.  Read  me  the  sign  of  the  seven  worlds 
of  women." 

Lewis  propped  his  head  on  one  elbow.     Before  him 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      69 

squatted  the  old  woman.  Her  hands  were  locked  about 
her  legs.  Her  chin  rested  on  her  knees.  Her  beady 
eyes  shone  like  two  black  stars. 

"And  shall  I  not  read  thee  a  sign?"  she  continued, 
swaying  from  side  to  side.  "Child  of  love  art  thou. 
At  thy  birth  was  thy  mother  rent  asunder,  for  thou 
wert  conceived  too  near  the  heart.  Thy  path  through 
the  world  is  blazed  as  one  blazes  a  path  in  the  forest. 
He  who  is  at  thy  side  is  before  thee  and  after  thee. 
Thou  travelest  in  darkness,  but  thou  art  cursed  and 
blessed  with  the  gift  of  sight.  The  worlds  of  women 
are  seven:  spirit,  weed,  flower,  the  blind,  the  visioned, 
libertine,  and  saint.  None  of  these  is  for  thee.  For 
each  child  of  love  there  is  a  woman  that  holds  the  seven 
worlds  within  a  single  breast.  Hold  fast  to  thy  birth- 
night,  even  though  thou  journey  with  thy  back  unto  the 
light.  I  have  spoken." 

A  long  silence  fell  upon  the  sand-dune.  Lewis  felt 
held,  oppressed.  He  was  tired.  He  wished  to  sleep, 
but  the  woman's  words  rang  in  his  brain  like  shouts 
echoing  in  an  empty  hall. 

Presently  came  sounds  from  the  mud  hut  beyond  the 
thorn-thicket.  Men  were  calling.  There  was  the  patter 
and  scrape  of  mules'  hoofs,  the  whistle  of  those  that 
urged  them  on.  Lewis  and  the  old  hag  hurried  down. 
The  guide,  the  muleteers,  and  the  stranger  were  having 
a  wordy  struggle. 


70      THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Hallo,"  said  the  stranger,  "where  have  you  been? 
What  are  they  trying  to  say  ?  I  need  you  even  in  my 
sleep." 

"They  say,"  said  Lewis,  "that  there  is  no  help  for  it ; 
we  must  push  on  to  the  river  now.  The  mules  must 
have  water." 

"Right  you  are,"  said  the  stranger.  He  pointed  to 
one  heavily  laden  mule.  "We  don't  need  those  pro- 
visions. Give  them  to  Old  Immortality.  They  '11  last 
her  a  hundred  years." 


CHAPTEK   XIII 

THEY  arrived  in  Petrolina  at  dawn.     Before  them 
swept  the  vast  river.    Beyond  it  could  be  seen 
the  dazzling  walls  and  restful,  brown-tiled  roofs  of  Joa- 
zeiro.     The  distant  whistle  of  a  shunting  locomotive 
jarred  on  the  morning  stillness. 

Eor  the  first  time  Lewis  saw  the  stranger  in  action. 
Off  came  the  loads.  They  were  sorted  rapidly.  Tent, 
outfit,  and  baggage  were  piled  into  one  of  the  ponderous 
ferry-canoes  that  lined  the  shore.  All  that  was  left  was 
handed  over  to  the  guide  for  equal  division  among  the 
men. 

"Now/'  cried  the  stranger,  "there  's  always  a  market- 
place. Tell  them  to  take  this  worn-out  bunch  along  and 
find  the  cattle  corner."  He  waved  at  the  ponies  and 
mules. 

The  market  was  in  full  swing.  Eubber,  goatskins, 
hides,  and  orchids  from  the  interior;  grain,  tobacco, 
sugar,  and  rum  from  the  river  valley,  met,  mingled,  and 
passed  at  this  crossways  of  commerce.  The  stranger 
stood  beside  his  mules.  The  dome  of  his  pith  helmet 
rose  above  the  average  level  of  heads.  People  gazed 
upon  it  in  mild  wonder,  and  began  to  crowd  around. 

71 


Y2      THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Now,"  said  the  stranger,  poking  Lewis's  thin  pony 
in  the  ribs,  "offer  this  jack-rabbit  for  sale,  cash  and  de- 
livery on  the  minute." 

"Offer  my — my  pony "  stammered  Lewis. 

The  stranger  eyed  him  grimly. 

"Your  pony  ?" 

Suddenly  Lewis  remembered.  He  threw  up  his  head 
and  called  out  as  he  was  bidden.  People  nudged  one 
another,  but  no  man  spoke.  Then  a  wag  on  the  out- 
skirts of  the  crowd  shouted : 

"I  '11  give  thee  a  penny  for  what  's  left  of  that  horse, 
brother." 

There  was  a  ripple  of  laughter.  Lewis  colored,  and 
his  eyes  grew  moist. 

"He  says  he  will  give  a  penny,"  he  said. 

"A  penny?"  said  the  stranger,  gravely.  "Take  it. 
Cash,  mind  you.  Cash  on  delivery." 

*The  sale  was  made  amid  general  consternation.  As 
the  dazed  wag  led  his  purchase  away,  he  trembled  as 
though  from  a  first  stroke  of  paralysis.  The  market- 
place began  to  buzz,  to  hum,  and  then  to  shout,  "A 
stranger  sells  horses  for  a  penny,  cash  on  delivery!" 
They  laughed  and  crowded  nearer.  Merchants  forgot 
their  dignity,  and  came  running  from  the  streets  of  the 
town. 

"Now,  boy,  this  one,"  said  the  stranger,  poking  a 


THKOUGH   STAINED   GLASS      Y3 

mule ;  "but  be  careful.  Be  careful  to  wait  for  the  high- 
est bid." 

The  stranger's  warning  came  just  in  time.  'No  sooner 
had  Lewis  called  the  mule  for  sale  than  bids  rained  on 
him  from  every  side.  One  after  the  other,  in  rapid 
succession,  the  animals  were  sold ;  but  no  more  went  for 
a  penny. 

His  pockets  stuffed  with  notes  and  silver,  the  stran- 
ger pushed  his  way  through  the  crowd,  suddenly  grown 
silent.  On  the  way  to  the  river  he  paid  off  his  men. 
He  climbed  into  the  canoe,  and  Lewis  followed.  The 
boatmen  shoved  off. 

The  wag,  leading  Lewis's  pony,  had  followed  them  to 
the  river-bank. 

"Show  me  thy  hoof,  partner,"  he  shouted,  laughing, 
to  the  stranger.  "Thou  shouldst  deal  in  souls,  not  in 
horses.  I  would  I  had  shaken  thy  hand.  God  go  with 
thee!" 

The  stranger  calmly  counted  his  money. 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "I  have  just  given  you  a  five-year 
life  in  five  minutes.  Write  this  down  in  your  mind. 
In  high  finance  he  who  knows  figures  starves  on  two 
dollars  a  day ;  success  comes  to  him  who  knows  men." 

During  the  long  hours  in  the  dirty  train  that  jerked 
them  toward  the  coast  and  civilization  the  stranger  be- 
gan to  grow  nervous.  Lewis  looked  up  more  than  once 
to  find  himself  the  object  of  a  troubled  gaze.  They 


H      THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

were  the  only  passengers.  There  were  moments  when 
the  road-bed  permitted  snatches  of  conversation,  but  it 
was  during  a  long  stop  on  a  side-track  that  the  stranger 
unburdened  himself. 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "the  time  is  coming  when  I  must  tell 
you  my  name." 

"I  know  your  name,"  said  Lewis. 

"What !"  cried  the  stranger. 

"I  know  your  name,"  repeated  Lewis;  "it  is 
Leighton." 

"How?  How  do  you  know?"  The  stranger  was 
frowning. 

"No,"  said  Lewis,  quietly;  "I  have  n't  been  looking 
through  your  things.  One  day  my — my  foster-father 
and  my  foster-mother  were  talking.  They  did  not  know 
I  was  near.  I  did  n't  realize  they  were  talking  about 
me  until  mammy  spoke  up.  Mammy  is — well,  you 
know,  she  's  just  a  mammy " 

"Yes,"  said  the  stranger.     "What  did  mammy  say  ?" 

"She  said,"  continued  Lewis,  coloring  slightly,  "that 
a  Leighton  did  n't  have  to  have  his  name  written  in  a 
family  Bible  because  God  never  forgets  to  write  it  in 
his  face." 

"Good  for  mammy !"  said  the  stranger.  "So  that  's 
what  they  were  talking  about."  For  a  moment  he  sat 
silent  and  thoughtful ;  then  he  said :  "Boy,  do  n't  you 
worry  about  any  family  Bible  business.  Your  name  's 


THKOFGH    STAINED    GLASS       75 

written  in  the  family  Bible  all  right.  Take  it  from  me ; 
I  know.  I  'm  Glendenning  Leighton — your  father." 
His  eyes  glistened. 

"I  'm  glad  about  the  name,"  said  Lewis,  his  face 
alight.  "I  'm  glad  you  're  my  dad,  too.  But  I  knew 
that." 

"Knew  it  ?    How  did  you  know  it  ?" 

"The  old  woman — Old  Immortality.  Do  n't  you  re- 
member ?  She  said,  'The  son  is  the  spit  of  the  father.' ' 

"Did  she?"  said  Leighton.  "Do  you  believe  every- 
thing as  easily  as  that  ?" 

"The  heart  believes  easily,"  said  Lewis. 

"Eh?   Where  'd  you  get  that?" 

"I  suppose  I  read  it  somewhere.  I  think  it  is  true. 
She  told  me  my  fortune." 

"Told  you  your  fortune,  did  she?  I  thought  I  was 
missing  something  when  I  snored  the  hours  away  in- 
stead of  talking  to  that  bright  old  lady.  Fortunes  are 
silly  things.  Do  you  remember  what  she  told  you  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  "I  think  I  remember  every  word. 
She  said,  'Child  of  love  art  thou.  At  thy  birth  was  thy 
mother  rent  asunder,  for  thou  wert  conceived  too  near 
the  heart '  " 

"Stop!" 

Lewis  looked  up.  His  father's  face  was  livid.  His 
breast  heaved  as  though  he  gasped  for  air.  Then  he 
clenched  his  fists.  Lewis  saw  the  veins  on  his  forehead 


76       THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

swell  as  he  fought  for  self-mastery.  He  calmed  himself 
deliberately;  then  slowly  he  dropped  his  face  in  his 
hands. 

"Some  day/'  he  said  in  a  voice  so  low  that  Lewis 
could  hardly  hear  the  words,  "I  shall  tell  you  of  your 
mother.  Not  now." 

Gloom,  like  a  tangible  presence,  filled  the  car.  It 
pressed  down  upon  Lewis.  He  felt  it,  but  in  his  heart 
he  knew  that  for  him  the  day  was  a  glad  day.  The  train 
started.  He  leaned  far  out  of  a  window.  The  evening 
breeze  was  blowing  from  the  east.  To  his  keen  nostrils 
came  a  faint  breath  of  the  sea.  When  he  drew  his  head 
in  again,  the  twinkle  he  had  already  learned  to  watch 
for  was  back  in  his  father's  eyes. 

"What  do  you  smell,  boy  ?" 

"I  smell  the  sea,"  said  Lewis. 

"How  do  you  know?  How  old  were  you  when  you 
made  your  first  voyage  ?" 

"Do  n't  you  know  ?" 

Leighton  shook  his  head. 

Lewis,  looking  at  his  father  with  wondering  eyes, 
regretted  the  spoken  question. 

"I  was  three  years  old.  I  suppose  I  remember  the 
smell  of  the  sea,  though  it  seems  as  if  I  could  n't  pos- 
sibly. I  remember  the  funnel  of  the  steamer,  though." 

"Seems  like  looking  back  on  a  quite  separate  life, 
does  n't  it  3" 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS      77 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  nodding,  "it  does." 

"Of  course  it  does,  and  in  that  fact  you  've  got  the 
germ  of  an  individual  philosophy.  Every  man  who 
goes  through  the  stress  of  life  has  need  of  an  individual 
philosophy." 

"What  's  yours,  sir  ?" 

"I  was  going  to  tell  you.  Life,  to  me,  is  like  this 
train,  a  lot  of  sections  and  a  lot  of  couplings.  When 
you  're  through  with  a  car,  side-track  it  and — yank  out 
the  coupling.  Like  all  philosophies,  this  one  has  its 
flaw.  Once  in  a  while  your  soul  looks  out  of  the  window 
and  sees  some  long-forgotten,  side-tracked  car  beckoning 
to  be  coupled  on  again.  If  you  try  to  go  back  and  pick 
it  up,  you  're  done.  Never  look  back,  boy;  never  look 
back.  Live  ahead  even  if  you  're  only  living  a  compen- 
sation." 

"What  's  a  compensation?"  asked  Lewis. 

"A  compensation,"  said  Leighton  thoughtfully,  "is  a 
thing  that  does  n't  quite  compensate." 

Above  the  rattle  of  the  train  sounded  the  deep  bellow 
of  a  steamer's  throttle.  Lewis  turned  to  the  window. 
Night  had  fallen. 

"Oh,  look,  sir!"  he  cried.     "We  're  almost  there!" 

Leighton  joined  him.  Before  them  were  spangled,  in 
a  great  crescent,  a  hundred  thousand  lights.  Along  the 
water-front  the  lights  clustered  thickly.  They  climbed 
a  cliff  in  long  zigzags.  At  the  top  they  clustered  again. 


78      THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Out  on  the  bay  they  swayed  from  halyards,  their  reflec- 
tions glimmering  back  from  the  rippling  water  like  so 
many  agitated  moons. 

"Eight  you  are — Bahia,"  said  Leighton.    "We  're  al- 
most there,  and  it  's  no  fishing-hamlet,  either." 


CHAPTEE   XIV 

THE  next  morning,  as  they  were  sitting,  after  their 
coffee  and  rolls,  at  a  little  iron  table  on  the 
esplanade  of  the  Sul  Americano,  Leighton  said:  "It 
takes  a  man  five  years  to  learn  how  to  travel  in  a  hurry 
and  fifteen  more  to  learn  how  not  to  hurry.  You  may 
consider  that  you  've  been  a  traveler  for  twenty  years." 
He  stretched  and  yawned.  "Let 's  take  a  walk,  slowly." 

They  started  down  the  broad  incline  which,  in  long, 
descending  zigzags,  cut  the  cliff  that  divided  lower 
town  from  upper.  The  closely  laid  cobblestones  were 
slippery  with  age. 

"It  took  a  thousand  slaves  a  century  to  pave  these 
streets,"  said  Leighton.  "Do  you  know  anything  about 
this  town,  Bahia  ?" 

"It  was  once  the  capital  of  the  empire,"  said  Lewis. 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton.  "Capital  of  the  empire,  seat 
of  learning,  citadel  of  the  church.,  last  and  greatest  of 
the  great  slave-marts.  That 's  a  history.  Never  bother 
your  mind  about  a  man,  a  woman,  or  a  town  that  has  n't 
got  a  history.  They  may  be  happy,  but  they  're  stupid." 

The  principal  street  of  the  lower  town  was  swarming 
with  a  strange  mixture  of  humanity.  Here  and  there 

79 


80r     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

hurried  a  foreigner  in  whites,  his  flushed  cheeks  and 
nose  flying  the  banner  of  John  Barleycorn. 

Along  the  sidewalks  passed  leisurely  the  doctorated 
product  of  the  universities — doctors  of  law,  doctors  of 
medicine,  embryo  doctors  still  in  the  making — each 
swinging  a  light  cane.  Their  black  hats  and  cutaway 
coats,  in  the  fashion  of  a  temperate  clime,  would  have 
looked  exotic  were  it  not  for  the  serene  dignity  with 
which  they  were  worn.  With  them,  merchants  lazed 
along,  making  a  deal  as  they  walked.  Clerks,  under 
their  masters'  eyes,  hurried  hither  and  thither. 

These  were  all  white  or  near-white.  The  middle  of 
the  street,  which  held  the  great  throng,  was  black. 
Slaves  with  nothing  on  but  a  loin-cloth  staggered  under 
two  bags  of  coffee  or  under  a  single  monster  sack  of 
cocoa.  Their  sweating  torsos  gleamed  where  the  slant- 
ing sun  struck  them.  Other  slaves  bore  other  burdens : 
a  basket  of  chickens  or  a  bundle  of  sugar-cane  on  the 
way  to  market;  a  case  of  goods  headed  for  the  stores 
of  some  importer;  now  and  then  a  sedan-chair,  with 
curtains  drawn ;  and  finally  a  piano,  unboxed,  on  a  pil- 
grimage. 

The  piano  came  up  the  middle  of  the  street  borne  on 
the  heads  of  six  singing  negroes.  For  a  hundred  yards 
they  would  carry  it  at  a  shuffling  trot,  their  bare  feet 
keeping  time  to  their  music,  then  they  would  set  it  down 
and,  clapping  their  hands  and  still  singing,  do  a  shuffle 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS      81 

dance  about  it.  This  was  the  shanty  of  piano-movers. 
No  other  slave  dared  sing  it.  It  was  the  badge  of  a 
guild. 

"D*  you  hear  that?"  asked  Leighton,  nodding  his 
head.  "That  's  a  shanty.  They  're  singing  to  keep 
step." 

In  shady  nooks  and  corners  and  in  the  cool,  wide 
doorways  sat  still  other  slaves:  porters  waiting  for  a 
stray  job ;  grayheads,  too  old  for  burdens,  plaiting  bas- 
kets ;  or  a  fat  mammy  behind  her  pot  of  couscous. 

Three  porters  sat  on  little  benches  on  the  top  step  of 
a  church  porch.  Leighton  approached  one  of  them. 

"Brother,"  he  said,  "give  me  your  stool." 

The  slave  rose,  and  straightened  to  a  great  height. 
He  held  up  his  hands  for  a  blessing.  He  grinned  when 
Leighton  sat  down  on  his  bench.  Then  he  looked  keenly 
at  Lewis's  face,  and  promptly  dragged  the  black  at  his 
side  to  his  feet. 

"Give  thy  bench  to  the  young  master,  thou  toad." 

Leighton  nodded  his  head. 

"No  fool,  the  old  boy,  eh  ?  The  son  's  the  spit  of  the 
father."  His  eyes  swept  the  swarming  street.  "What 
men!  What  men!"  He  was  looking  at  the  blacks. 
"Boy,  did  you  ever  hear  of  a  general  uprising  among 
the  slaves  at  home,  in  the  States  ?" 

"No,"  said  Lewis ;  "there  never  was  one." 

"Exactly,"   said  Leighton.     "There  never  was  one 


82      THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

because  in  the  early  days  our  planters  found  out  what 
not  to  buy  in  the  way  of  black  meat.  They  were  n't 
looking  for  the  indomitable  spirit.  They  were  n't  look- 
ing for  men,  but  for  slaves,  and  the  black-birders  soon 
learned  that  if  they  did  n't  want  to  carry  their  cargo 
farther  than  New  Orleans  they  had  to  load  up  with 
members  of  the  gentlest  tribes.  Now,  there  have  been 
terrible  uprisings  of  blacks  in  the  West  Indies,  in  Dem- 
erara  and  here.  Ask  this  old  chap  of  what  race  he  is." 

Lewis  turned  and  asked  the  question.  The  tall  black 
straightened,  his  face  grew  stern,  his  eyes  moist. 

"Tito,  my  name.  I  am  of  the  tribe  of  Minas.  In  the 
time  of  thy  grandfather  I  was  traded  as  ransom  for  a 
king." 

"Hm-m,  I  can  believe  it,"  said  Leighton.  "Now  ask 
the  next  one,  the  copper-colored  giant." 

"And  thou?"  said  Lewis. 

"I?  I  am  a  Fulah  of  the  Fulahs.  Before  blacks 
were,  or  whites,  we  were  thus,  the  color  of  both." 

"You  see  ?"  said  Leighton.  "Pride.  He  was  afraid 
you  'd  take  him  for  a  mulatto.  Now  the  other  fellow, 
there." 

"And  thou  ?"  said  Lewis. 

The  third  black  had  remained  seated.  He  turned  his 
eyes  slowly  to  Lewis. 

"I  am  no  slave,"  he  began.     "I  am  of  the  tribe  of 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      83 

Houssa.  To  my  master's  wealth  I  added  fifteen  of  my 
sons.  In  the  great  rebellion  they  fell,  one  and  all." 

"The  great  rebellion,"  said  Leighton.  "He  means 
the  last  Houssa  uprising.  Thirty  thousand  of  'em,  and 
they  fought  and  fell  to  a  man.  The  Government  was 
glad  of  the  chance  to  wipe  'em  out.  Ask  him  how  he 
escaped." 

"Escaped?"  The  black's  eyes  gleamed.  "Child,  I 
did  not  escape.  My  master's  son  was  a  babe  in  arms. 
My  master  bade  me  bear  him  to  safety.  When  I  came 
back,  alone  I  bore  my  master  to  the  grave.  Then  it  was 
too  late.  They  would  not  kill  me.  Now  the  babe  is 
grown.  He  tells  me  I  am  a  free  man.  It  is  written  on 
paper." 

While  Leighton  and  Lewis  watched  the  crowd,  they 
themselves  did  not  remain  unnoticed.  A  small  group  of 
the  leisurely  class  began  to  block  the  pavement  before 
them.  Father  and  son  were  a  strange  pair.  Lewis  was 
still  in  his  leather  cow-boy  clothes.  Alone,  he  would 
not  have  attracted  more  notice  than  a  man  with  a  beard 
and  a  carpet-bag  on  Broadway ;  but  the  juxtaposition  of 
pith  helmet,  a  thing  unknown  in  those  parts,  and  coun- 
tryman's flat  leather  hat,  and  the  fact  of  their  wearers 
usurping  the  seats  of  two  black  carriers  was  too  much 
for  one  native  son,  dressed  in  the  latest  Paris  fashion. 

"Thou,  porter,"  he  called  to  Leighton,  "an  errand 


84      THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

for  thee.  Go  fetch  my  father.  He  would  not  miss  this 
sight." 

"What  does  he  say  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

Lewis  blushed  as  people  stopped  and  added  their 
sparkling  eyes  to  those  of  the  crowd  already  gathered. 

"He  calls  you  a  porter,  and  bids  you  fetch  his  father 
to  see  the  sight." 

"Ask  him,"  said  Leighton,  calmly,  "shall  I  know  him 
who  he  thinks  is  his  father  by  his  horns  ?" 

Lewis  translated  innocently  enough.  The  crowd 
gasped,  and  then  roared  with  laughter.  The  youth  in 
Paris  clothes  turned  purple  with  rage,  shook  his  little 
cane  at  Leighton,  and  burst  into  abusive  language. 

"Why,"  cried  Lewis — "why,  what  's  the  matter  with 
him?" 

"I'm  sure  I  do  n't  know,"  said  Leighton,  pensively. 
"'And  just  now  he  was  so  dignified !" 

A  private  sedan-chair,  borne  by  four  splendid  blacks, 
swung  by  at  a  run.  As  it  passed,  one  of  its  silk  cur- 
tains was  drawn  aside  and  the  face  of  a  woman,  curious 
to  see  the  reason  of  the  crowd,  looked  out.  The  face 
was  clear  white,  blue-veined,  red-lipped ;  under  the  black 
eyes  were  shadows.  A  slight  smile  curved  the  red  lips 
as  the  shadowy  eyes  fell  upon  Leighton  and  Lewis. 

Leighton  went  tense,  like  a  hound  in  leash. 

"Look,  boy !"  he  cried.    "A  patrician  passes !" 

The  lady  heard,  understood.     The  smile,  that  was 


THBOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      85 

half-disdain,     deepened.       She    bowed    slightly,    but 

graciously.     The  curtain  fell. 

"Come,  boy,"  said  Leighton,  "we  can  't  stand  that. 

Let  's  go  find  a  tailor." 

"Dad,"  said  Lewis,  "do  you  know  her  ?    She  bowed." 
"She  did,  God  bless  her!"  said  Leighton.     "No,  I 

do  n't  know  her ;  but  let  's  think  kindly  of  her,  for  she 

has  added  a  charming  memory  to  life." 


CHAPTEE    XV 

FOUR  days  later  Lewis  sat  beside  his  bed,  piled  high 
with  all  the  paraphernalia  that  go  to  make  up  a 
gentleman's  wardrobe  and  toilet.  He  was  very  nervous 
— so  nervous  that  he  had  passed  an  hour  striding  from 
one  side  of  the  small  bedroom  to  the  other,  making  up 
his  mind  to  try  to  carry  out  his  father's  instructions, 
which  were  simply  to  go  to  his  room  and  dress.  Lewis 
had  never  in  his  life  put  on  a  collar  or  knotted  a  tie. 

He  answered  a  knock  on  the  door  with  a  cry  of  dis- 
may. Leighton  strode  into  the  room. 

"Well,  what  's  the  matter  ?" 

Lewis  looked  ruefully  from  his  father's  face  to  the 
things  on  the  bed  and  back  again.  He  felt  himself 
flushing  painfully.  He  opened  his  mouth  to  speak  and 
then  closed  it. 

Suddenly  Leighton's  face  lit  up.    He  laughed. 

"Well,  well,"  he  cried,  "this  is  splendid!  You  've 
given  me  a  new  sensation."  He  yanked  a  bath-robe 
from  the  bed.  "Here,  you  savage,  shed  those  leather 
togs,  but  do  n't  lose  them.  You  '11  want  to  take  them 
out  and  look  at  them  some  stuffy  day.  Now  put  this  on 
and  run  to  your  bath." 

86 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS      87 

When  Lewis  came  back  to  the  room  he  found  most  of 
his  things  had  been  packed  away  in  the  big,  new  trunk. 
On  the  bed  certain  garments  were  laid  out.  They  were 
laid  out  in  correct  order. 

Leighton  stood  beside  the  bed  in  a  deferential  atti- 
tude. His  face  was  a  blank.  "Will  you  be  wearing  the 
white  flannels  to-night,  sir,  or  the  dinner-jacket  ?  If 
you  will  allow  me,  I  would  suggest  the  flannels.  Sultry 
evening,  and  Mr.  Leighton  will  be  dining  on  the  ter- 
race." 

"Yes,  I  '11  wear  the  flannels,"  stammered  Lewis. 

"Your  singlet,  sir,"  said  Leighton,  picking  up  the 
undershirt  from  the  bed.  Article  after  article  he 
handed  to  his  son  in  allotted  order.  Lewis  put  each 
thing  on  as  fast  as  his  nervous  hands  would  let  him.  He 
tried  to  keep  his  eyes  from  wandering  to  the  head  of  the 
line,  where  lay  collar  and  tie.  The  collar  had  been  but- 
toned to  the  back  of  the  shirt,  but  when  it  came  to 
fastening  it  in  front,  Lewis's  fingers  fumbled  hopelessly. 

"Allow  me,  sir,"  said  Leighton.  He  fastened  the  col- 
lar deftly.  "I  see  you  do  n't  like  that  tie  with  the  flan- 
nels, sir.  My  mistake." 

He  threw  open  the  trunk,  and  took  out  a  brown  cravat 
of  soft  silk.  "Your  brown  scarf,  sir.  It  goes  well  with 
the  flannels.  Will  you  watch  in  the  glass,  sir?"  He 
placed  the  cravat,  measured  it  carefully,  knotted  it,  and 
drew  it  up. 


88      THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  did  not  watch  in  the  mirror.  His  eyes  were 
fixed  on  his  father's  mask  of  a  face.  He  knew  that, 
inside,  his  father  was  bubbling  with  fun ;  but  no  ripple 
showed  in  his  face,  no  disrespectful  twinkle  in  his  eye. 
Leighton  was  playing  the  game.  Suddenly,  for  no  rea- 
son that  he  could  name,  Lewis  began  to  adore  his  father. 

"Will  that  do,  sir?" 

"Certainly,"  stammered  Lewis.  "Very  nicely,  thank 
you." 

"Thank  you,  sir,"  said  Leighton.  He  handed  Lewis 
the  flannel  trousers  and  then  the  coat. 

As  Lewis  finished  putting  them  on,  Leighton  whirled 
on  his  heel. 

"Ready,  my  boy  ?"    The  mask  was  gone. 

Lewis  laughed  back  into  his  father's  twinkling  eyes. 

"Yes,  I  'm  ready,"  he  said  rather  breathlessly.  He 
followed  his  father  out  of  the  room.  The  new  clothes 
gripped  him  in  awkward  places,  but  as  he  glanced  down 
at  the  well-pressed  flannels,  he  felt  glorified. 

That  night,  while  strolling  in  a  back  street  of  the 
lower  town,  they  discovered  a  tunnel  running  into  the 
cliff.  At  its  mouth  was  a  turnstile. 

"Shades  of  Avernus !    What's  this  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

Lewis  inquired  of  the  gateman. 

"It 's  an  elevator  to  the  upper  town,"  he  said. 

They  paid  their  fare  and  walked  into  the  long  tun- 
nel. At  its  end  they  found  a  prehistoric  elevator  and 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS      89 

a  terrific  stench.  Leighton  clapped  his  handkerchief  to 
his  nose  and  dived  into  the  waiting  car.  Lewis  followed 
him.  An  attendant  started  the  car,  and  slowly  they 
crept  up  and  up,  two  hundred  feet,  to  the  crest  of  the 
cliff.  As  they  emerged,  Leighton  let  go  a  mighty  breath. 

"Holy  mackerel!"  he  said,  "and  what  was  that? 
Ugh !  it  's  here  yet !" 

The  attendant  explained.  At  the  bottom  of  the  shaft 
was  a  pit  into  which  sank  the  great  chains  of  the  car. 
The  pit  was  full  of  crude  castor-oil,  cheapest  and  best 
of  lubricants. 

"My  boy,"  said  Leighton,  as  he  led  the  way  at  a 
rapid  stride  toward  the  hotel,  "never  confuse  the  pic- 
turesque with  the  ugly.  I  can  stand  a  bit  of  local  color 
in  the  way  of  smells,  but  there  's  such  a  thing  as  going 
too  far,  and  that  went  it.  We  '11  prepare  at  once  to 
leave  this  town.  Would  you  like  to  go  north  or  south  ?" 

"I  do  n't  know,  sir,"  said  Lewis. 

"Well,  we  '11  just  climb  on  board  that  big  double- 
funnel  that  came  in  to-day  and  leave  it  to  her.  What 
do  you  say?" 

They  went  south.  Four  days  later,  in  the  early 
morning,  Lewis  was  wakened  by  a  bath-robe  hurled  at 
his  head. 

"Put  that  on  and  come  up  on  deck  quick!"  com- 
manded his  father. 

Lewis  gasped  when  he  reached  the  deck.    They  were 


90       THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

just  entering  the  harbor.  On  the  left,  so  close  that  it 
seemed  to  threaten  them,  loomed  the  Sugar-Loaf.  On 
the  right,  the  wash  of  the  steamer  creamed  on  the  rocks 
of  Santa  Cruz.  Before  them  opened  the  mighty  bay, 
dotted  with  a  hundred  islands,  some  crowned  with 
foliage,  others  with  gleaming,  white  walls,  and  one  with 
an  aspiring  minaret.  Between  water  and  sky  stretched 
the  city.  There  was  no  horizon,  for  the  jagged  wall 
of  the  Organ  Mountains  towered  in  a  circle  into  the 
misty  blue.  Heaven  and  earth  were  one. 

A  white  line  of  surf-foam  ran  along  all  the  edge  of 
the  bay.  Languorous  Aphrodite  of  the  cities  of  the 
world,  Rio  de  Janeiro  lay  naked  beyond  that  line,  and 
gloried.  Like  a  dream  of  fair  woman,  her  feet  plunged 
in  foam,  her  body  reclining  against  the  heights,  her 
arms  outstretched,  green  hills  for  her  pillows,  her  dia- 
dem the  shining  mountain-peaks,  queen  of  the  cities 
of  the  earth  by  the  gift  of  Almighty  God,  she  gleamed 
beneath  the  kiss  of  dawn. 

Leighton  drew  a  long,  long  breath. 

"It  will  take  a  lot  of  bad  smells  to  blot  the  memory 
of  that,"  he  said. 

They  came  to  the  bad  smells  in  about  an  hour  and  a 
quarter.  An  hour  later  they  left  the  custom-house. 
Then,  each  in  a  rocketing  tilbury,  driven  by  a  yelling 
Jehu,  they  shot  through  the  narrow  and  filthy  streets 
of  the  Rio  of  that  far  day  and  drew  up,  still  trembling 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       91 

with,  fright,  at  the  doors  of  the  Hotel  dos  Estrangeiros. 

"You  got  here,  too !"  cried  Leighton  as  Lewis  tumbled 
out  of  his  cab.  "We  had  both  wheels  on  the  ground 
at  once  three  separate  times.  How  about  you?" 

"I  really  don't  know  anything  about  what  happened, 
sir,"  said  Lewis,  grinning.  "I  was  holding  on." 

"What  were  they  yelling?  Did  you  make  anything 
out  of  that  ?"  asked  Leighton,  when  they  had  surveyed 
their  rooms  and  were  washing. 

"They  were  shouting  at  the  people  in  the  way,"  said 
Lewis.  "My  driver  yelled  only  two  things.  When  a 
colored  person  was  in  the  way,  it  was,  'Melt  chocolate- 
drop!"  and  when  he  shouted  at  a  white  man,  it  was: 
'Clear  the  way  to  hell !  a  foreigner  rides  with  me.' ' 

"Boy,"  said  Leighton,  speaking  through  several  folds 
of  towel  and  the  open  connecting-door,  "if  you  ever  find 
your  brains  running  to  seed,  get  a  job  as  a  cabman. 
There's  something  about  a  cab,  the  world  over,  that 
breeds  wit." 


CHAPTEE    XVI 

THE  Rio  of  1888  was  seething  at  the  vortex  of 
the  wordy  battle  for  emancipation.  The  Ouvi- 
dor,  the  smart  street  of  the  town,  so  narrow  that  car- 
riages were  not  allowed  upon  it,  was  the  center  of  the 
maelstrom.  Here  crowded  politician  and  planter ;  law- 
yers, journalists,  and  students;  conservative  and  eman- 
cipationist. 

At  each  end  of  the  Ouvidor  were  squares  where  daily 
meetings  were  held  the  emotional  surge  of  which  threat- 
ened to  lap  over  into  revolution  at  any  moment. 

The  emotion  was  real.  Youths  of  twenty  blossomed 
into  verse  never  equaled  before  or  since  in  the  writings 
of  their  prolific  race.  An  orator,  maddened  by  the 
limits  of  verbal  expression,  shot  himself  through  the 
heart  to  add  a  fitting  period  to  a  thundered  phrase. 
Women  forgot  their  own  bondage,  and  stripped  them- 
selves of  jewels  for  the  cause. 

Leighton  and  his  son,  wandering  through  these 
scenes,  felt  like  ghosts.  They  had  the  certainty  that  all 
this  had  happened  before.  Their  lonely,  calm  faces 
drew  upon  them  hostile,  wondering  stares. 

"Got  a  clean  tablet  in  your  mind  ?"  asked  Leighton 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       93 

one  day  as  they  emerged  from  an  unusually  excited 
scene.  "Write  this  down :  Nothing  bores  one  like  some- 
body else's  belated  emotions.  When  you've  had  some 
woman  insist  on  kissing  you  after  you're  tired  of  her, 
you'll  understand  me  better.  In  the  meantime,  this  is 
bad  enough.  I  can  think  of  only  one  cure  for  what 
we've  been  through  here,  and  that  is  a  Sunday  in  Lon- 
don. Let  us  start." 

"London !"  breathed  Lewis.  "Are  we  going  to  Lon- 
don ?" 

"Yes,  we  are.  It  's  a  peculiar  fact,  well  known  and 
long  cursed  among  travelers,  that  all  the  steamers  in 
the  world  arrive  in  England  on  Saturday  afternoon. 
We  '11  get  to  London  for  Sunday." 

During  the  long  voyage,  for  the  first  time  since  the 
day  on  which  he  met  the  stranger,  and  which  already 
seemed  of  long  ago,  Lewis  had  time  to  think.  A  sad- 
ness settled  on  him.  What  were  they  doing  at  Nadir 
on  this  starry  night  ?  Were  the  goats  corraled  ?  Who 
had  brought  them  in  ?  Was  mammy  crooning  songs  of 
low-swinging  chariots  and  golden  stairs?  Was  Mrs. 
Leighton  still  patiently  sewing?  The  Reverend  Orme, 
was  he  still  sitting  scowling  and  staring  and  staring? 
And  Natalie?  Was  she  there,  or  was  she  gone,  mar- 
ried? He  drew  a  great,  quivering  sigh. 

Leighton  looked  around. 

"Trying  to  pick  up  a  side-tracked  car?" 


94       THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  smiled  faintly,  but  understandingly. 

"It 's  not  quite  side-tracked — yet,"  he  said. 

"Ah,  boy,  never  look  back,"  said  Leighton.  "But, 
no;  do.  Do  look  back.  You  're  young  yet.  Tell  me 
about  it." 

Then  for  a  long  time  Lewis  talked  of  Nadir:  of  the 
life  there,  of  the  Reverend  Orme,  grown  morose  through 
unnamed  troubles;  of  Mrs.  Leighton,  withered  away 
till  naught  but  patience  was  left;  of  happy  mammy, 
grown  sad;  of  Natalie,  friend,  playmate,  and  sacrifice. 

"So  they  wanted  to  marry  your  little  pal  into 
motherhood  twenty  times  over,  ready-made,"  said 
Leighton.  "And  you  fought  them,  told  'em  what  you 
thought  of  it.  You  were  right,  boy;  you  were  right. 
The  wilderness  must  have  turned  their  heads.  But  you 
ought  to  have  stayed  with  it.  Why  did  n't  you  stay 
with  it  ?  You  're  no  quitter." 

"There  were  things  I  said  to  the  Reverend  Orme," 
said  Lewis,  slowly — "things  I  knew,  that  made  it  im- 
possible for  me  to  stay." 

"Things  you  knew  ?    What  things  ?" 

Lewis  did  not  answer. 

It  was  on  a  gray  Sunday  that  they  entered  London. 
In  a  four-wheeler,  the  roof  of  which  groaned  under  a 
pyramid  of  baggage,  they  started  out  into  the  mighty 
silence  of  deserted  streets.  The  plunk!  plunk!  of  the 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       95 

horse's  shod  hoofs  crashed  against  the  blank  walls  of 
the  shuttered  houses  and  reverberated  ahead  of  them 
until  sound  dribbled  away  down  the  gorge  of  the  all- 
embracing  nothing.  Gray,  gray ;  heaven  and  earth  and 
life  were  gray. 

Lewis  felt  like  crying,  but  Leighton  came  to  the 
rescue.  He  was  in  high  spirits. 

"Boy,  look  out  of  the  window.  Is  there  anywhere 
in  the  world  a  youth  spouting  verse  on  a  street  corner  ?" 

"No,"  said  Lewis. 

"Or  an  orator  shooting  himself  to  give  point  to  an 
impassioned  speech?" 

"No." 

"Or  women  shaking  their  bangles  into  the  melting- 
pot  for  the  cause  of  freedom  ?" 

"No." 

"I  should  say  not.  This  is  Sunday  in  London.  Take 
off  your  hat.  You  are  in  the  graveyard  of  all  the  emo- 
tions of  the  earth." 

Up  one  flight  of  stairs,  over  a  tobacconist's  shop, 
Leighton  raised  and  dropped  the  massive  bronze 
knocker  on  a  deep-set  door.  He  saw  Lewis's  eyes  fix 
on  the  ponderous  knocker. 

"Strong  door  to  stand  it,  eh  ?  They  don't  make  'em 
that  way  any  more." 

The  door  swung  open.  A  man-servant  in  black  bowed 
as  Leighton  entered. 


96       THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Glad  to  welcome  you  back,  sir.  I  hope  you  are 
well,  sir." 

"Thanks,  Nclton,  I  'm  well  as  well.  So  is  Master 
Lewis.  Got  his  room  ready?  Show  him  the  bath." 

Lewis,  looking  upon  Nelton,  suddenly  remembered  a 
little  room  in  the  Sul  Americano  at  Bahia.  He  felt 
sure  that  when  Nelton  opened  his  mouth  it  would  be 
to  say,  "Will  you  be  wearing  the  white  flannels  to-night, 
sir,  or  the  dinner-jacket  ?" 

By  lunch-time  Leighton's  high  spirits  were  on  the 
decline,  by  four  o'clock  they  had  struck  bottom.  He 
kept  walking  to  the  windows,  only  to  turn  his  back 
quickly  on  what  he  saw.  At  last  he  said : 

"D'  you  know  what  a  'hundred  to  one  shot'  is?" 

"No,  sir,"  said  Lewis. 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "watch  me  play  one."  He  sat 
down,  wrote  a  hurried  note,  and  sent  it  out  by  Nelton. 
"The  chances,  my  boy,  are  one  hundred  to  one  that  the 
lady  's  out  of  town." 

When  Nelton  came  back  with  an  answer,  Leighton 
scarcely  stopped  to  open  it. 

"Come  on,  boy,"  he  called,  and  was  off.  By  the  time 
Lewis  reached  the  street,  his  father  was  stepping  into 
a  cab.  Lewis  scrambled  after  him. 

"Does  n't  seem  proper,  Dad,  to  rush  through  a  grave- 
yard this  way." 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS       97 

"Graveyard  ?  It  is  n't  a  graveyard  any  more.  I  '11 
prove  it  to  you  in  a  minute." 

It  was  more  than  a  minute  before  they  pulled  up  at 
a  house  that  seemed  to  belie  Leighton's  promise.  Its 
door  was  under  a  massive  portico  the  columns  of  which 
rose  above  the  second  story.  The  portico  was  flanked 
by  a  parapeted  balcony,  upon  which  faced,  on  each 
side,  a  row  of  French  windows,  closed  and  curtained, 
but  not  shuttered. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

LEIGHTON"  rang.  The  door  was  opened  by  a  man 
in  livery.  So  pompous  was  he  that  Lewis  gazed 
at  him  open-mouthed.  He  could  hardly  tear  his  eyes 
from  him  to  follow  his  father,  who  was  being  conducted 
by  a  second  footman  across  the  glassy,  waxed  hall  into 
a  vast  drawing-room. 

The  drawing-room  might  have  been  a  tomb  for  kings, 
but  Lewis  felt  more  awed  by  it  than  depressed.  It  was 
a  room  of  distances.  Upon  its  stately  walls  hung  only 
six  paintings  and  a  tapestry.  Leighton  did  not  tell  his 
son  that  the  walls  carried  seven  fortunes,  because  he 
happened  to  be  one  of  those  who  saw  them  only  as  seven 
things  of  joy. 

There  were  other  things  in  the  room  besides  the  pic- 
tures: a  few  chairs,  the  brocade  of  which  matched  the 
tapestry  on  the  wall;  an  inlaid  spinet;  three  bronzes. 
Before  one  of  the  bronzes  Lewis  stopped  involuntarily. 
From  its  massive,  columned  base  to  the  tip  of  the  living 
figure  it  was  in  one  piece.  Out  of  the  pedestal  itself 
writhed  the  tortured,  reaching  figure — aspiring  man 
held  to  earth.  Lewis  stretched  out  a  reverent  hand  as 
though  he  would  touch  it. 

98 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS       99 

The  lackey  had  thrown  open  a  door  and  stood  wait- 
ing. Leighton  turned  and  called: 

"Come  on,  boy." 

Lewis  followed  them  through  a  second  drawing-room 
and  into  a  library.  Here  they  were  asked  to  sit.  Never 
had  Lewis  dreamed  of  such  a  room.  It  was  all  in  oak 
— in  oak  to  which  a  century  of  ripening  had  given  a 
rare  flower. 

There  was  only  one  picture,  and  that  was  placed  over 
the  great  fireplace.  It  was  the  portrait  of  a  beautiful 
woman — waves  of  gray  hair  above  a  young  face  and 
bright  black  eyes.  The  face  laughed  at  them  and  at  the 
rows  upon  rows  of  somber  books  that  reached  from  floor 
to  ceiling. 

Before  the  fireplace  were  two  leather  chairs  and  a 
great  leather  couch.  At  each  end  of  the  couch  stood 
lighted  lamps,  shaded  to  a  deep-amber  glow. 

The  lackey  returned. 

"Her  ladyship  waits  for  you  in  her  room,  sir." 

Leighton  nodded,  and  led  Lewis  down  a  short  hall. 
The  library  had  been  dark,  the  hall  was  darker.  Lewis 
felt  depressed.  He  heard  his  father  knock  on  a  door 
and  then  open  it.  Lewis  caught  his  breath. 

The  door  had  opened  on  a  little  realm  of  light.  Fresh 
blue  and  white  cretonnes  and  chintzes  met  his  unaccus- 
tomed eyes;  straight  chairs,  easy-chairs,  and  deep,  low 
comfy  chairs ;  airy  tables,  the  preposterously  slender  legs 


100     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

of  which  looked  frail  and  were  not ;  books,  paper-backed, 
and  gay  magazines;  a  wondrous,  limpid  cheval-glass. 

Across  the  farther  side  of  the  room  was  a  very  wide 
window.  Through  its  slender  gothic  panes  one  saw  a 
walled  lawn  and  a  single  elm.  Beside  the  window  and 
half  turned  toward  it,  so  that  the  light  fell  across  her 
face,  sat  the  woman  of  the  portrait. 

"How  do !"  she  cried  gaily  to  Leighton,  and  held  out 
her  hand.  She  did  not  rise. 

"Helene,"  said  Leighton,  "your  room  's  so  cursedly 
feminine  that  it 's  like  an  assault  for  a  man  to  enter  it." 

"I  can  't  give  you  credit  for  that,  Glen,"  said  the  lady, 
laughing.  "You  ?ve  had  a  year  to  think  it  up.  Where 
have  you  been  ?  That 's  right.  Sit  down,  light  up,  and 
talk." 

Leighton  nodded  over  his  shoulder  at  Lewis. 

"Been  fetching  him." 

"So  this  is  the  boy,  is  it  ?"  The  bright  eyes  stopped 
smiling.  For  an  instant  they  became  shrewd.  They 
swept  Lewis  from  head  to  foot  and  back  again.  Lewis 
bowed,  and  then  stood  very  straight.  He  felt  the  color 
mounting  in  his  cheeks.  The  smile  came  back  to  the 
lady's  eyes. 

"Sit  down,  boy,"  she  said. 

For  an  hour  Lewis  sat  on  the  edge  of  a  chair  and 
listened  to  a  stream  of  questions  and  chatter.  The 
chatter  was  Greek  to  him.  It  skimmed  over  the  surface 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     101 

of  things  like  a  swift  skater  over  thin  ice.  It  never 
broke  into  deep  waters,  but  somehow  you  knew  the  deep 
waters  were  there. 

At  last  Leighton  arose. 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "come  here.  This  lady  is  my  pal. 
There  are  times  when  a  man  has  to  tell  things  to  a 
woman.  That  's  what  women  are  for.  When  you  feel 
you  've  got  to  tell  things  to  a  woman,  you  come  and 
tell  them  to  Helene.  Don't  be  afraid  of  that  peacock 
of  a  doorman ;  push  him  over.  He  's  so  stiff  he  '11  topple 
easy." 

"Oh,  please  do  n't  ever!"  cried  the  lady,  turning  to 
Lewis.  "I  '11  give  you  money  to  tip  him."  She  turned 
back  to  Leighton.  "They  're  so  hard  to  get  with  legs, 
Glen." 

"Legs  be  hanged !"  said  Leighton.  "Our  age  is  trad- 
ing civility  for  legs.  The  face  that  welcomes  you  to  a 
house  should  be  benign " 

"There  you  go,"  broke  in  the  lady.  "If  you  'd  think 
a  minute,  you  would  realize  that  we  do  n't  charter  door- 
men to  welcome  people,  but  to  keep  them  out."  She 
turned  to  Lewis.  "But  not  you,  boy.  You  may  come 
any  time  except  between  nine  and  ten.  That  's  when  I 
have  my  bath.  What  's  your  name  2  I  can  't  call  you 
boy  forever." 

"Lewis." 


102     THKOUGH   STAINED   GLASS 

"Well,  Lew,  you"  may  call  me  Helene,  like  your 
father.  It  '11  make  me  feel  even  younger  than  I  am." 

"Helene  is  a  pretty  name,"  said  Lewis. 

"None  of  that,  young  man,"  said  Leighton.  "You  '11 
call  Helene  my  Lady." 

"That  's  a  pretty  name,  too,"  said  Lewis. 

"Yes,"  said  the  lady,  rising  and  holding  out  her  hand, 
"call  me  that — at  the  door." 

"Dad,"  said  Lewis  as  they  walked  hack  to  the  flat, 
"does  she  live  all  alone  in  that  big  house  ?" 

Leighton  came  out  of  a  reverie. 

"That  lady,  Lew,  is  Lady  Helene  Deri.  She  is  the 
wife  of  Lord  Deri.  You  won't  see  much  of  Lord  Deri, 
because  he  spends  most  of  his  time  in  a  sort  of  home 
for  incurables.  His  hobby  is  faunal  research.  In 
other  words,  he  's  a  drunkard.  Bah!  We  won't  talk 
any  more  about  that/' 


CHAPTEE   XVIH 

A  FEW  months  later,  when  Lewis  had  very  much 
modified  his  ideas  of  London,  he  was  walking 
with  his  father  in  the  park  at  the  hour  which  the  gen- 
eral English  fitness  of  things  assigns  to  the  initiated. 
A  very  little  breaking  in  and  a  great  deal  of  tailoring 
had  gone  a  long  way  with  Lewis.  Men  looked  at  father 
and  son  as  though  they  thought  they  ought  to  recognize 
them  even  if  they  did  n't.  Women  turned  kindly  eyes 
upon  them. 

The  morning  after  Lady  Deri  took  Lewis  into  her 
carriage  in  the  park  she  received  three  separate  notes 
from  female  friends  demanding  that  she  "diwy  up." 
Knowing  women  in  general  and  the  three  in  special,  she 
prepared  to  comply.  Often  Lewis  and  his  father  had 
been  summoned  by  a  scribbled  note  for  pot-luck  with 
Lady  Deri;  but  this  time  it  was  a  formal  invitation, 
engraved. 

Lewis  read  his  card  casually.  His  face  lighted  up. 
Leighton  read  his  with  deeper  perception,  and  frowned. 

"Already!"  he  grunted.  Then  he  said:  "When 
you  've  finished  breakfast,  come  to  my  den.  I  want 
to  talk  to  you." 

103 


104    THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  found  his  father  sitting  like  a  judge  on  the 
bench,  behind  a  great  oak  desk  he  rarely  used.  An  en- 
velope, addressed,  lay  before  him.  He  rang  for  Nelton 
and  sent  it  out. 

"Sit  down,"  he  said  to  Lewis.  "Where  did  you  get 
your  education?  By  education  I  don't  mean  a  knowl- 
edge of  knives,  forks,  and  fish-eaters.  That 's  from  Ann 
Leighton,  of  course.  Nor  do  I  mean  the  power  of  add- 
ing two  to  two  or  reciting  A  B  C  D,  etc.  By  education 
a  gentleman  means  skill  in  handling  life." 

"And  have  I  got  it  ?"  asked  Lewis,  smiling. 

"You  meet  life  with  a  calmness  and  deftness  un- 
usual in  a  boy,"  said  Leighton,  gravely. 

"I — I  do  n't  know,"  began  Lewis.  "I  've  never  been 
educated.  By  the  time  I  was  nine  I  knew  how  to  read 
and  write  and  figure  a  little.  After  that — you  know — 
I  just  sat  on  the  hills  for  years  with  the  goats.  I  read 
the  Reverend  Orme's  books,  of  course." 

"What  were  the  books  ?" 

"There  were  n't  many,"  said  Lewis.  "There  was 
the  Bible,  of  course.  There  was  a  little  set  of  Shak- 
spere  in  awfully  fine  print  and  a  set  of  Walter  Scott." 

Leighton  nodded.  "The  Bible  is  essential  but  not 
educative  until  you  learn  to  depolarize  it.  Shakspere 
— you  '11  begin  to  read  Shakspere  in  about  ten  years. 
Walter  Scott.  Scott — well — Scott  is  just  a  bright  ax 
for  the  neck  of  time.  What  else  did  you  read  ?" 


"I  read  The  City  of  God'  but  not  very  often." 

For  a  second  Leighton  stared;  then  he  burst  into 
laughter.  He  checked  himself  suddenly. 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "do  n't  misunderstand.  I  'm  not 
laughing  at  the  book;  I  'm  laughing  at  your  reading 
St.  Augustine  even  'not  very  often !'  " 

"Why  should  n't  you  laugh?"  asked  Lewis,  simply. 
"I  laughed  sometimes.  I  remember  I  always  laughed 
at  the  heading  to  the  twenty-first  book." 

"Did  you?"  said  Leighton,  a  look  of  wonder  in  his 
face.  "What  is  it?  I  do  n't  quite  recollect  the  head- 
ings that  far." 

"  'Of  the  eternal  punishment  of  the  wicked  in  hell, 
and  of  the  various  objections  urged  against  it,'  "  quoted 
Lewis,  smiling. 

Leighton  grinned  his  appreciation. 

"There  is  a  flavor  about  unconscious  humor,"  he 
said,  "that  's  like  the  bouquet  to  a  fine  wine :  only  the 
initiated  catch  it.  I  'm  afraid  you  were  an  educated 
person  even  before  you  read  St.  Augustine.  Did  he 
put  up  a  good  case  for  torment?  You  see,  you  've 
found  me  out.  I  've  never  read  him." 

"His  case  was  weak  in  spots,"  said  Lewis.  "His 
examples  from  nature,  for  instance,  proving  that  bodies 
may  remain  unconsumed  and  alive  in  fire." 

"Yes  ?"  said  Leighton. 

"He  starts  out,  'if,  therefore  the  salamander  lives  in 


106     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

fire,  as  naturalists  have  recorded '  I  looked  up  sala- 
mander in  the  dictionary." 

Lewis's  eyes  were  laughing,  but  Leighton's  grew  sud- 
denly grave.  "Poor  old  chap!"  he  said.  "He  did  n't 
know  that  time  rots  the  sanest  argument.  'Oh  .  .  . 
that  mine  adversary  had  written  a  book/  cried  one  who 
knew." 

Leighton  sat  thoughtful  for  a  moment,  then  he  threw 
up  his  head. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "we  '11  give  up  trying  to  find  out 
how  you  got  educated.  Let  's  change  the  subject.  Has 
it  occurred  to  you  that  at  any  moment  you  may  be 
called  upon  to  support  yourself?" 

"It  did  once,"  said  Lewis,  "when  I  started  for 
Oeiras.  Then  I  met  you.  You  have  n't  given  me  time 
or — or  cause  to  think  about  it  since.  I  'm — I  'm  not 
ungrateful ' ' 

^That  's  enough,"  broke  in  Leighton.  "Let  's  stick 
to  the  point.  It  's  a  lucky  thing  for  the  progress  of 
the  world  that  riches  often  take  to  the  wing.  It  may 
happen  to  any  of  us  at  any  time.  The  amount  of 
stupidity  that  sweating  humanity  applies  to  the  task  of 
making  a  living  is  colossal.  In  about  a  million  years 
we  '11  learn  that  making  a  living  consists  in  knowing 
how  to  do  well  any  necessary  thing.  It  's  harder  for  a 
gentleman  to  make  a  living  than  for  a  farm-hand.  But 
— come  with  me." 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     107 

He  took  Lewis  to  a  certain  Mecca  of  mighty  appe- 
tites in  the  Strand.  Before  choosing  a  table,  he  made 
the  round  of  the  roasts,  shoulders  and  fowl.  They  were 
in  great  domed,  silver  salvers,  each  on  a  barrow,  each 
kept  hot  over  lighted  lamps. 

Leighton  seated  himself  and  ordered. 

"Now,  boy,  without  staring  take  a  good  look  at  the 
man  that  does  the  carving." 

One  of  the  barrows  was  trundled  to  their  table.  An 
attendant  lifted  the  domed  cover  with  a  flourish.  With 
astounding  rapidity  the  carver  took  an  even  cut  from 
the  mighty  round  of  beef,  then  another.  The  cover  was 
clapped  on  again,  and  the  barrow  trundled  away. 

"You  saw  him  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

Lewis  nodded. 

"Well,  that  chap  got  through  twenty  thousand  a  year, 
— pounds,  not  dollars, — capital  and  income,  in  just  five 
years.  After  that  he  starved.  I  know  a  man  that  lent 
him  half  a  crown.  The  borrower  said  he  'd  live  on  it 
for  a  week.  Then  he  found  out  that,  despite  being  a 
gentleman,  there  was  one  little  thing  he  could  do  well. 
He  could  make  a  roast  duck  fall  apart  as  though  by 
magic,  and  he  could  handle  a  full-sized  carving-knife 
with  the  ease  and  the  grace  of  a  duchess  handling  a 
fan.  Now  he  's  getting  eight  hundred  a  year — pounds 
again — and  all  he  can  eat." 

From  the  eating-house  Leighton  took  Lewis  to  his 


club.  He  sought  out  a  small  room  that  is  called  the 
smoking-room  to  this  day,  relic  of  an  age  when  smokers 
were  still  a  race  apart.  In  the  corner  sat  an  old  man 
reading.  He  was  neatly  dressed  in  black.  Beside  him 
was  a  decanter  of  port. 

Leighton  led  the  way  back  to  the  lounge-room. 

"Well,  did  you  see  him  ?" 

"The  old  man?"  said  Lewis.     "Yes,  I  saw  him." 

"That's  Old  Ivory,"  said  Leighton.  "He  's  an  hon- 
orable. He  was  cursed  by  the  premature  birth — to  him 
— of  several  brothers.  In  other  words,  he  's  that  saddest 
of  British  institutions,  a  younger  son.  His  brothers, 
the  other  younger  sons,  are  still  eating  out  of  the  hand 
of  their  eldest  brother,  Lord  Bellim.  But  not  Old 
Ivory.  He  bought  himself  an  annuity  ten  years  ago. 
How  did  he  do  it?  Well,  he  had  enough  intelligence 
to  realize  that  he  had  n't  much.  He  decided  he  could 
learn  to  shoot  well  at  fifty  yards.  He  did.  Then  he 
went  after  elephants,  and  got  'em,  in  a  day  when  they 
shipped  ivory  not  by  the  tusk,  but  by  the  ton,  and  sold 
it  at  fifteen  shillings  a  pound."  As  they  walked  back 
to  the  flat,  Leighton  said:  "IsTow,  take  your  time  and 
think.  Is  there  anything  you  know  how  to  do  well?" 

"Nothing,"  stammered  Lewis  —  "nothing  except 
goats." 

"Ah,  yes,  goats,"  said  Leighton,  but  his  thoughts  were 
not  on  goats.  Back  in  his  den,  he  took  from  a  drawer 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     109 

in  the  great  oak  desk  the  kid  that  Lewis  had  molded 
in  clay  and  its  broken  legs,  for  another  had  gone.  He 
looked  at  the  fragments  thoughtfully.  "To  my  mind," 
he  said,  "there  is  little  doubt  but  that  you  could  become 
efficient  at  terra-cotta  designing ;  you  might  even  become 
a  sculptor." 

"A  sculptor!"  repeated  Lewis,  as  though  he  voiced 
a  dream. 

Leighton  paid  no  attention  to  the  interruption.  "I 
hesitate,  however,  to  give  you  a  start  toward  art  because 
you  carry  an  air  of  success  with  you.  One  predicts 
success  for  you  too — too  confidently.  And  success  in 
art  is  a  formidable  source  of  danger." 

"Success  a  source  of  danger,  Dad?" 

"In  art,"  corrected  Leighton. 

"Yesterday,"  he  continued,  "you  wanted  to  stop  at 
a  shop  window,  and  I  would  n't  let  you.  The  window 
contained  an  inane  repetition  display  of  thirty  hor- 
rible prints  at  two  and  six  each  of  Lalan's  'Triumph.' ' 
Leighton  sprang  to  his  feet.  "God !  Poster  lithographs 
at  two  and  six !  Boy,  Lalan's  'Triumph'  was  a  triumph 
once.  He  turned  it  into  a  mere  success.  Before  the 
paint  was  dry,  he  let  them  commercialize  his  picture, 
not  in  sturdy,  faithful  prints,  but  in  that — that  rub- 
bish." 

Leighton  strode  up  and  down  the  room,  his  arms  be- 
hind him,  his  eyes  on  the  floor. 


110     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Taking  art  into  the  poor  man's  home,  they  call  it. 
Bah !  If  you  multiply  the  greatest  glory  that  the  genius 
of  man  ever  imprisoned,  and  put  it  all  over  the  walls 
of  your  house, — bath,  kitchen  and  under  the  bed, — 
you  '11  find  the  mean  level  of  that  glory  is  reduced  to 
the  terms  of  the  humblest  of  household  utensils." 

A  smile  flickered  in  Lewis's  eyes,  but  Leighton  did 
not  look  up. 

"Art  is  never  a  constant,"  he  continued.  "It  feeds 
on  spirit,  and  spirit  is  evanescent.  A  truly  great  pic- 
ture should  be  seen  by  the  comparative  few.  What  every 
one  possesses  is  necessarily  a  commonplace. 

"And  now,  to  get  back.  I  have  never  talked  seri- 
ously to  you  before;  I  may  never  do  it  again.  The 
essence,  the  distinctive  finesse,  of  breeding,  lies  in  a 
trained  gaiety  and  an  implied  sincerity.  But  what  I 
must  say  to  you  is  this :  Even  in  this  leveling  age  there 
are  a  few  of  us  who  look  with  terror  upon  an  incipient 
socialism ;  who  believe  money  as  money  to  be  despicable 
and  food  and  clothing,  incidental;  who  abhor  equality, 
cherish  sorrow  and  suffering  and  look  upon  education 
— knowledge  of  living  before  God  and  man — as  the  ulti- 
mate and  only  source  of  content.  That  's  a  creed.  I  'd 
like  to  have  you  think  on  it.  I  'd  like  to  have  my  boy 
join  the  Old  Guard.  Do  you  begin  to  see  how  success 
in  art  may  become  a  danger?" 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     111 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  "I  think  I  do.  I  think  you  mean 
that — that  in  selling  art  one  is  apt  to  sell  one's  self." 

"H — m — m!"  said  Leighton,  "you  are  older  than  I 
am.  I  '11  take  you  to  Paris  to-morrow." 

Helton  knocked,  and  threw  open  the  door  without 
waiting  for  an  answer. 

"Her  ladyship,"  he  announced. 

Lady  Deri  entered.  She  was  looking  very  girlish  in 
a  close-fitting,  tailored  walking-suit.  The  skirt  was 
short — the  first  short  skirt  to  reach  London.  Beneath 
it  could  be  seen  her  very  pretty  feet.  They  walked 
excitedly. 

Lady  Deri  was  angry.  She  held  a  large  card  in  her 
hand.  She  tore  it  into  bits  and  tossed  it  at  Leighton's 
feet. 

"Glen,"  she  said,  "do  n't  you  ever  dare  to  send  me 
one  of  your  engraved  'regrets'  again.  Why — why 
you  've  been  rude  to  me!" 

Leighton  hung  his  head.  For  one  second  Lewis  had 
the  delightful  sensation  of  taking  his  father  for  a 
brother  and  in  trouble. 

"Helene,"  said  Leighton.  "I  apologize  humbly  and 
abjectly.  I  thought  it  would  amuse  you." 

"Apologies  are  hateful,"  said  Lady  Deri.  "They  're 
so  final.  To  see  a  fine  young  quarrel,  in  the  prime  of 
life,  die  by  lightning — sad!  sad!"  She  started  draw- 
ing off  her  gloves.  "Let  's  have  tea."  As  she  poured 


112     THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

tea  for  them  she  asked,  "And  what  's  the  real  reason 
you  two  are  n't  coming  to  my  dinner  ?" 

Leighton  picked  up  the  maimed  kid  and  laid  it  on 
the  tea-tray.  He  nodded  toward  Lewis. 

"He  made  it.    I  'm  going  to  gamble  a  bit  on  him." 

"Poor  little  thing !"  said  Lady  Deri,  poking  the  two- 
legged  kid  with  her  finger. 

"I  'm  going  to  put  him  under  Le  Brux, — Saint  An- 
thony,— if  he  '11  take  him,"  continued  Leighton.  "We 
leave  for  Paris  to-morrow." 

"Under  Saint  Anthony?"  repeated  Lady  Deri. 
"H — m — m!  Perhaps  you  are  right.  But  Blanche, 
Berthe,  and  Vi  will  hold  it  against  me." 

When  Lewis  was  alone  with  his  father,  he  asked: 
"Does  Lady  Deri  belong  to  the  Old  Guard  ?" 

"You  would  n't  think  it,  but  she  does,"  said  Leigh- 
ton, — "inside." 


MY  boy,"  said  Leighton  to  Lewis  two  days  later, 
as  they  were  threading  a  narrow  street  in 
the  shadow  of  Montmartre,  "you  will  meet  in  a  few 
moments  Le  Brux,  the  only  living  sculptor.  You  will 
call  him  Maitre  from  the  start.  If  he  cuffs  you  or 
swears  at  you,  call  him  Mon  MaUre.  That  's  all  the 
French  you  will  need  for  some  months." 

Leighton  dodged  by  a  sleepy  concierge  with  a  grunted 
greeting  and  climbed  a  broad  stone  stairway,  then  a 
narrower  flight.  He  knocked  on  a  door  and  opened  it. 
They  passed  into  an  enormous  room,  cluttered,  if  such 
space  could  be  said  to  be  cluttered,  with  casts,  molding- 
boards,  clay,  dry  and  wet,  a  throne,  a  couch,  a  work- 
man's bench,  and  some  dilapidated  chairs.  A  man  in 
a  smock  stood  in  the  midst  of  the  litter. 

When  Lewis's  eye  fell  upon  him  as  he  turned  toward 
them,  the  room  suddenly  became  dwarfed.  The  man 
was  a  giant.  A  tremendous  head,  crowned  with  a  mass 
of  grayish  hair,  surmounted  a  monster  body.  The  voice, 
when  it  came,  did  justice  to  such  a  frame.  "My  old 
one,  my  friend,  Letonne !  Thou  art  well  come.  Thou 
art  the  saving  grace  to  an  idle  hour." 

113 


114     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Once  more  Lewis  sat  for  a  long  time  listening  to 
chatter  that  was  quite  unintelligible.  But  he  scarcely 
listened,  for  his  eyes  had  robbed  his  brain  of  action. 
They  roamed  and  feasted  upon  one  bit  of  sculpture 
after  another.  Casts,  discarded  in  corners,  gleamed 
through  layers  of  dust  that  could  not  hide  their  won- 
drous contour.  Others  hung  upon  the  wall.  Some 
were  fragments.  A  monster  group,  half  finished,  held 
the  center  of  the  floor.  A  ladder  was  beside  it. 

Leighton  got  up  and  strolled  around.  "What  's 
new  ?"  he  asked.  His  eyes  fell  on  the  cast  of  an  arm, 
a  fragment.  The  arm  was  outstretched.  It  was  the  arm 
of  a  woman.  So  lightly  had  it  been  molded  that  it 
seemed  to  float.  It  seemed  pillowed  on  invisible  clouds. 

"Maltre,"  said  Leighton,  "I  want  that.  How  much  ?" 

Le  Brux  moved  over  beside  the  cast.  As  he  ap- 
proached it,  Lewis  stared  at  his  bulk,  at  his  hairy  chest, 
showing  at  the  open  neck  of  his  smock,  at  his  great, 
nervous  hands,  and  wondered  if  this  could  be  the  cre- 
ator of  so  soft  a  dream  in  clay. 

"Bah!  That?"  sai'd  Le  Brux.  "It  is  only  a  trifle. 
Take  it.  It  is  thine." 

"I  '11  tell  you  what  we  '11  do,"  said  Leighton.  "You 
lend  me  the  arm,  and  I  '11  lend  you  a  thousand  francs." 

"Done!"  cried  Le  Brux,  with  a  laugh  that  shook 
heaven  and  earth.  "Ah,  rascal,  thou  knowest  that  I 
never  pay." 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     115 

As  they  went  the  rounds  of  the  atelier,  Lewis  saw 
that  his  father  was  growing  nervous.  Finally,  Leigh- 
ton  drew  from  his  pocket  the  little  kid  and  its  two 
broken  legs.  He  held  the  .lot  out  to  Le  Brux.  The 
fragments  seemed  to  dwindle  to  pin-points  in  Le  Brux's 
vast  hand. 

"Well,"  he  asked,  "what  's  this?" 

Leighton  nodded  toward  Lewis, 

"My  boy  made  that." 

Le  Brux  glanced  down  at  his  hand.  A  glint  of  inter- 
est lighted  his  eyes  and  passed.  Then  a  tremendous 
frown  darkened  his  brow. 

"A  pupil,  eh?  Bah!"  With  his  thumb  and  fore- 
finger he  crushed  the  kid  to  powder.  "I  '11  take  no 
pupil." 

Lewis  gulped  in  dismay  at  seeing  his  kid  demolished, 
but  not  so  Leighton.  He  had  noted  the  glint  of  interest. 
He  turned  on  Le  Brux. 

"You  '11  take  no  pupil,  eh  ?  All  right,  do  n't.  But 
you  '11  take  my  son.  You  shall  and  you  will." 

"I  will  not,"  growled  Le  Brux. 

"Maitre"  began  Leighton — "but  whom  am  I  calling 
Maitre  f  What  are  you  ?  D'  you  know  what  you  are  ?" 
He  shook  his  finger  in  Le  Brux's  face.  "You  think 
you  're  a  creator,  but  you  're  not.  You  're  nothing  but 
a  palimpsest,  the  record  of  a  single  age.  What  are  your 
works  but  one  man's  thumb-print  on  the  face  of  time? 


116     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Here  I  am  giving  you  a  chance  to  be  a  creator,  to  breed 
a  live  human  that  will  carry  on  the  torch — that  will — " 

Le  Brux  had  seated  himself  heavily  on  the  couch. 
He  held  his  massive  head  between  his  hands  and 
groaned. 

"Ah,  Letonne,"  he  interrupted,  "our  old  friendship 
is  dead — dead  by  violence.  Friends  have  said  things 
to  me  before, — called  me  names, — and  I  have  stood  it. 
But  none  of  them  ever  dared  call  me  a  palimpsest. 
Thou  hast  called  me  a  palimpsest !" 

Leighton  seemed  not  to  hear. 

"Somebody,"  he  continued,  "that  will  carry  on  the 
mighty  tradition  of  Le  Brux.  I  could  take  a  pupil  to 
any  one  of  a  lot  of  whipper-snappers  that  fondle  clay, 
but  my  son  I  bring  to  you.  Why?  Because  you  are 
the  greatest  living  sculptor?  No.  No  great  sculptor 
ever  made  another.  If  my  boy  's  to  be  a  sculptor,  the 
only  way  you  could  stop  him  would  be  to  choke  him  to 
death." 

"I  had  n't  thought  of  that,"  broke  in  Le  Brux,  with 
a  look  of  relief.  "If  he  bothers  me,  eh?  It  would  be 
easy." 

In  a  flash  Leighton  was  all  smiles. 

"So,"  he  said,  "it  is  settled.  Lewis  you  stay  here. 
If  he  throws  you  out,  come  back  again." 

"Eh!  eh!"  cried  Le  Brux,  "not  so  fast.  Listen.  This 
is  the  most  I  can  do.  I  '11  let  him  stay  here.  I  '11 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     11Y 

give  him  the  room  down  the  hall  that  I  rent  to  keep 
any  one  else  out,  and — and — I'll  use  him  for  a  model." 

Leighton  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"_So,  let  it  be  so/'  he  said.  "The  boy  will  make  his 
own  way  into  your  big,  hollow  heart,  and  use  it  for  a 
playroom.  But  just  remember,  Mattre,  that  he  is  a 
boy — my  boy.  If  he  is  to  go  in  for  all  this," — Leigh- 
ton  waved  his  hand  at  the  casts, — "I  want  him  to  start 
in  with  a  man  who  sees  art  and  art  only,  a  man  who 
did  n't  turn  beast  the  first  time  he  realized  God  did  n't 
create  woman  with  petticoats." 

Le  Brux's  eyes  bulged  with  comprehension.  He 
thumped  his  resounding  chest. 

"Me!"  he  cried — "me,  a  wet  nurse!"  He  yanked 
open  another  button  of  his  smock.  "Behold  me !  Have 
I  the  attributes?" 

Leighton  turned  his  back  on  him. 

"Now  you  are  ranting,"  he  said.  He  picked  up  an 
old  newspaper  from  the  floor  and  started  to  wrap  up 
the  cast  he  had  bought.  "Now  listen,  Maitre.  Go  and 
dress  yourself  for  a  change.  The  boy  and  I  will  spend 
a  few  hours  looking  for  a  fiacre  that  will  stand  the 
weight.  Then  we  '11  come  back,  and  I  '11  take  you  out 
for  a  drive  to  a  place  where  you  can  remind  yourself 
what  a  tree  looks  like.  I  '11  also  give  you  a  dinner 
that  you  could  n't  order  in  an  hour  with  Careme  hold- 
ing your  hand." 


118     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Ah,  mon  enfant/'  sighed  Le  Brux,  folding  his  hands 
across  his  stomach,  "thou  hast  struck  me  below  the  belt. 
Thou  knowest  that  my  memory  is  not  so  short  but  what 
I  will  dine  with  thee." 

When  at  seven  o'  clock  the  three  sat  down  at  a  table 
which,  like  everything  else  that  came  in  contact  with 
Le  Brux,  seemed  a  size  too  small,  Leighton  said  to  his 
guest: 

"Ma&re,  it  has  been  my  endeavor  to  provide  to-night 
a  single  essence  from  each  of  the  five  great  epochs  of 
modern  cookery." 

"Yes,  my  child?"  said  Le  Brux,  gravely,  but  with 
an  expectant  gleam  in  his  eye. 

"In  no  branch  of  science,"  continued  Leighton,  "have 
progress  and  innovation  been  so  constantly  associated 
as  in  gastronomy,  and  we  shall  consequently  abandon 
the  rule  of  the  savants  of  the  last  generation  and  pro- 
ceed from  the  light  to  the  less  light  and  then  to  the 
rich." 

"I  agree,"  said  Le  Brux. 

Leighton  nodded  to  the  attendant.    Soup  was  served. 

"Creme  d'asperges  a  la  reine"  murmured  Le  Brux. 
"Friend,  is  it  not  a  source  of  regret  that  with  the  ex- 
ception of  the  swallows'-nest  extravaganza  and  your 
American  essence  of  turtle,  no  soup  has  yet  been  in- 
vented the  price  of  which  is  not  within  the  reach  of  the 
common  herd?  I  predict  that  even  this  dream  of  a 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     119 

master  will  become  a  commonplace  within  a  genera- 
tion." 

"I  am  sorry,"  said  Leighton,  "that  the  boy  can't 
understand  you.  Your  remark  caps  an  argument  I 
had  with  him  the  other  day  on  the  evanescent  spirit  in 
art." 

The  fish  arrived. 

"The  only  fish,"  remarked  Leighton,  "that  can  prop- 
erly be  served  without  a  sauce." 

"And  why?"  said  Le  Brux,  helping  himself  to  the 
young  trout  fried  in  olive  oil  and  simply  garnished  with 
lemon.  "I  will  tell  thee.  Because  God  himself  hath 
half  prepared  the  dish,  giving  to  this  dainty  creature  a 
fragrance  which  assails  the  senses  of  man  and  adds  to 
eating  a  vision  of  purling  brooks  and  overhanging, 
boughs."  Suddenly,  with  his  fork  half-way  to  his 
mouth,  he  paused,  and  glared  at  Lewis,  who  was  on 
the  point  of  helping  himself.  "Sacrilege!" 

Leighton  looked  up. 

"My  old  one,  you  are  perhaps  right."  He  turned  to 
Lewis.  "Better  skip  the  fish."  At  the  next  dish  he 
remarked,  "Following  the  theory  that  a  dinner  should 
progress  as  a  child  learning  to  walk,  Maitre,  I  have  at 
this  point  dared  to  introduce  an  entremets — cepes  francs 
d  la  tete  noire 

"A.   la  bordelaise"   completed   Le   Brux,    his  nose 


120     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

above  the  dish.  He  helped  Leighton  to  half  of  its  con- 
tents and  himself  to  the  rest. 

"Have  patience,  my  old  one,"  cried  Leighton,  "the 
boy  may  have  an  uneducated  palate,  but  he  is  none  the 
less  possessed  of  a  sublobular  void  that  demands  filling 
at  stated  intervals." 

"Bah!"  cried  Le  Brux,  "order  him  a  dish  of  tripe 
with  onions — and  vin  ordinaire.  But  he  '11  have  to  sit 
at  another  table." 

"No,"  said  Leighton,  "that  won't  do.  We  '11  let  him 
sit  here  and  watch  us.  and  when  they  come,  we  '11  give 
him  all  the  sweets  and  we  '11  watch  him." 

"Agreed,"  said  Le  Brux. 


CHAPTEK    XX 

IF  events  had  been  moving  rapidly  with  Lewis,  they 
had  by  no  means  been  at  a  standstill  at  Nadir  since 
that  troubled  day  on  which  he  had  rebelled,  quarreled, 
and  fled,  leaving  behind  him  wrath  and  tears  and  awak- 
ened hearts  where  all  had  been  apathy  and  somnolence. 

Many  happenings  at  Nadir  were  dated  from  the  day 
that  Lewis  went  away.  Late  that  night  mammy  and 
Mrs.  Leighton,  aided  by  trembling  Natalie,  had  had 
to  carry  the  Reverend  Orme  from  his  chair  in  the 
school-room  to  his  bed.  The  left  side  of  his  face  was 
drawn  grotesquely  out  of  line,  but  despite  the  disfigure- 
ment, there  was  a  look  of  peace  in  his  ravaged  coun- 
tenance, as  of  one  who  welcomes  night  joyfully  and 
calmly  after  a  long  battle. 

Perhaps  it  was  this  look  of  peace  that  made  Ann 
Leighton  regard  this  latest  as  the  lightest  of  all  the 
calamities  that  had  fallen  upon  her  frail  shoulders.  She 
felt  that  in  a  measure  the  catastrophe  had  brought  the 
Reverend  Orme  back — nearer  to  her  heart.  Her  heart, 
which  had  seemed  to  atrophy  and  shrivel  from  disuse 
since  the  poignant  fullness  of  the  last  days  of  Shenton, 
was  suddenly  revivified.  Love,  pity,  tender  care, — all 

121 


122     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

the  discarded  emotions, — returned  to  light  up  her  with- 
ered face  and  give  it  beauty.  Night  and  day  she  stayed 
beside  the  Reverend  Orme,  reading  aright  his  slightest 
movement. 

To  Natalie  one  need  stood  out  above  all  others — the 
need  for  Lewis.  At  first  she  waited  for  news  of  him, 
but  none  came;  then  she  sought  out  Dom  Francisco. 
Word  was  passed  to  the  cattlemen.  They  said  Lewis 
had  been  bound  for  Oeiras.  A  messenger  was  sent  to 
Oeiras.  He  came  back  with  the  news  that  Lewis  had 
never  arrived  there.  He  had  been  traced  half-way. 
After  that  no  one  on  the  long  straight  trail  had  seen 
the  boy.  The  wilderness  had  swallowed  him. 

Dom  Francisco  came  almost  daily  to  see  the  Reverend 
Orme.  "Behold  him !"  he  cried  at  his  first  visit,  aghast 
at  the  havoc  the  stroke  had  played  with  the  tall  frame. 
"He  is  but  a  boy,  he  has  fathered  but  two  children — 
and  yet — behold  him !  He  is  broken !"  The  sight  of 
the  Reverend  Orme,  suddenly  grown  pitifully  old, 
seemed  to  work  on  the  white-haired,  but  sturdy,  cattle- 
king  by  reflection.  He,  too,  grew  old  suddenly. 

Natalie  was  the  first  to  notice  it.  She  began  to  nurse 
the  old  man  as  she  nursed  her  father, — to  treat  him  as 
she  would  a  child.  When  one  day  he  spoke  almost 
tremulously  of  the  marriage  that  was  to  be,  she  did 
not  even  answer  him,  contenting  herself  with  the  smile 
with  which  one  humors  extreme  youth  clamoring  for 


THROUGH    STAINED   GLASS     123 

the  moon.  Gradually,  without  any  discussion  or  open 
refusal  on  the  part  of  Natalie,  it  became  understood  not 
only  to  Dom  Francisco,  but  to  all  the  circle  at  Nadir, 
that  she  would  never  marry  the  old  cattle-king. 

The  sudden  departure  of  Lewis,  the  Reverend  Orme's 
breakdown,  with  its  intimate  worry  displacing  all  lesser 
cares,  the  absorption  of  Ann  Leighton  as  her  husband's 
constant  attendant — these  things  made  of  Natalie  a 
woman  in  a  night.  She  assumed  direction  of  the  house, 
and  calmly  ordered  mammy  around  in  a  way  that 
warmed  that  old  soul,  born  to  cheerful  servitude.  She 
hired  a  goatherd  and  rigidly  oversaw  his  handiwork. 
Then  she  approached  Dom  Francisco  one  evening  as 
he  sat  at  her  father's  bedside  and  told  him  that  he  must 
find  a  purchaser  for  the  goats — all  of  them. 

The  Reverend  Orme,  although  he  heard,  took  no 
interest  in  any  temporal  affair.  Mrs.  Leighton  looked 
up  and  asked  mildly: 

"Why,  dear?" 

"Because  we  need  money,"  said  Natalie.  "No  doctor 
would  come  here.  We  must  take  father  away." 

No  one  recoiled  from  the  idea;  but  it  was  new  to 
them  all  except  Natalie.  It  took  days  and  days  for  it 
to  sink  in.  It  was  on  Dom  Francisco  that  Natalie  most 
exerted  herself.  He  had  aged,  and  age  had  made  him 
weak.  He  fell  a  slow,  but  easy,  prey  to  her  youth, 
grown  sweetly  dominant.  He  himself  would  arrange 


124    THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

to  buy  the  enormous  herd  of  goats,  the  greatest  in  the 
country-side.  And,  finally,  with  a  great  shrinking  from 
the  definite  implication,  he  agreed  to  buy  back  Nadir 
as  well. 

No  mere  argument  could  have  led  the  old  man  to 
such  a  concession.  It  was  love — love  for  these  strangers 
that  he  had  cherished  within  his  gates,  love  for  the 
gloomy  man  whom  he  had  seen  young  and  then  old,  love 
for  Ann  and  Natalie  and  mammy,  with  their  quiet  ways, 
love  for  the  very  way  of  life  of  all  of  them — a  way  dis- 
tantly above  anything  he  had  ever  dreamed  before  their 
coming,  that  drove  him,  almost  against  his  will,  to  speed 
their  parting.  He  sent  for  money.  He  himself  spent 
long,  wistful  hours  preparing  the  ox-wagon,  the  litter, 
and  the  horses  that  were  to  bear  them  away. 

Then  one  night  the  Eeverend  Orme  slept  and  awoke 
no  more.  In  the  morning  Natalie  went  into  the  room 
and  found  her  mother  sitting  very  still  beside  the  bed, 
one  of  the  Eeverend  Orme's  hands  in  both  of  hers. 
Tears  followed  each  other  slowly  down  her  cheeks.  She 
did  not  brush  them  away. 

"Mother !"  cried  Natalie,  in  the  first  grip  of  premo- 
nition. 

"Hush,  dear!"  said  Mrs.  Leighton.     "He  is  gone." 

They  buried  him  at  the  very  top  of  the  valley,  where 
the  eye,  guided  by  the  parallel  hills,  sought  ever  and 
again  the  great  mountain  thirty  miles  away.  In  that 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     125 

clear  air  the  distant  mountain  seemed  very  near.  There 
were  those  who  said  they  could  see  the  holy  cross  upon 
its  brow. 

That  night  Mrs.  Leighton  and  mammy  sat  idle  and 
staring  in  the  house.  Suddenly  they  had  realized  that 
for  them  the  years  of  tears  had  passed.  They  looked 
at  each  other  and  wondered  by  what  long  road  calm 
had  come  to  them.  Not  so  Natalie.  Natalie  was  out 
in  the  night,  out  upon  the  hills. 

She  climbed  the  highest  of  them  all.  As  she  stumbled 
up  the  rise,  she  lifted  her  eyes  to  the  stars.  The  stars 
were  very  high,  very  far,  very  cold.  They  struck  at 
her  sight  like  needles. 

Natalie  covered  her  eyes.  She  stood  on  the  crest  of 
the  hill.  Her  glorious  hair  had  fallen  and  wrapped 
her  with  its  still  mantle.  Her  slight  breast  was  heaving. 
She  could  hear  her  struggling  heart  pounding  at  its 
cage.  She  drew  a  long  breath.  With  all  the  strength 
of  her  young  lungs  she  called:  "Lew,  where  are  you? 
O,  Lew,  you  must  come !  O,  Lew,  I  need  you !" 

The  low  hills  gave  back  no  echo.  It  was  not  silence 
that  swallowed  her  desperate  cry,  but  distance,  over- 
whelming distance.  She  stared  wide-eyed  across  the 
plain.  Suddenly  faith  left  her.  She  knew  that  Lewis 
could  not  hear.  She  knew  that  she  was  alone.  She 
crumpled  into  a  little  heap  on  the  top  of  the  highest 
hill,  buried  her  face  in  her  soft  hair,  and  sobbed. 


126     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

The  conviction  that  their  wilderness  held  Lewis  no 
longer  brought  a  certain  strength  to  Natalie's  sudden 
womanhood.  It  was  as  though  Fate  had  cried  to  her, 
"The  burden  is  all  thine;  take  it  up,"  and  with  the 
same  breath  had  given  her  the  sure  courage  that  comes 
with  renunciation.  She  answered  Dom  Francisco's 
wistful  questioning  before  it  could  take  shape  in  words. 

"We  cannot  stay,"  she  said.  "We  must  go.  You 
will  still  help  us  to  go." 

Nature's  long  silences  breed  silence  in  man.  Dom 
Francisco  ceased  to  question  even  with  his  eyes.  He 
made  all  ready,  delivered  them  into  the  hands  of  trusted 
henchmen,  and  bade  them  God's  speed.  They  struck 
out  for  the  sea,  but  not  by  the  long  road  that  Lewis 
and  the  stranger  had  followed.  There  was  a  nearer 
Northern  port.  Toward  it  they  set  their  faces,  Con- 
solation Cottage  their  goal. 


CHAPTER   XXI 

THREE  weeks  to  a  day  from  the  time  lie  had  left 
Lewis  in  Paris,  as  Nelton  was  serving  him  with 
breakfast,  Leighton  received  a  telegram  that  gave  him 
no  inconsiderable  shock.  The  telegram  was  from  Le 
Brux. 

"Come  at  once,"  it  said;  "your  son  has  killed  me." 

Leighton  steadied  himself  with  the  thought  that  Le 
Brux  was  still  alive  enough  to  wire  before  he  said: 

"Nelton,  I  'm  off  for  Paris  at  once.  You  have  half 
an  hour  to  pack  and  get  me  to  Charing  Cross." 

JSTine  hours  later  he  was  taking  the  stairs  at  Le 
Brux's  two  steps  at  a  time.  As  he  approached  the  ate- 
lier, he  heard  sighing  groans.  He  threw  open  the  door 
without  knocking.  Stretched  on  the  couch  was  the 
giant  frame,  wallowing  feebly  like  a  harpooned  whale 
at  the  last  gasp. 

"Mattre!"  cried  Leighton. 

The  sculptor  half  raised  himself,  turned  a  worn  face 
on  Leighton,  and  then  burst  into  a  tremendous  laugh 
— one  of  those  laughs  that  is  so  violent  as  to  be  painful. 

127 


128     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Ha!  ha!  ha!  Ho!  ho!  ho!"  he  roared,  and  fell  back 
upon  his  side. 

Leighton  felt  somebody  pecking  at  his  arm.  He 
turned,  to  find  the  old  concierge  beside  him. 

"Oh,  sir,"  she  almost  wept,  "can't  you  do  something  ? 
He  has  been  like  that  all  day." 

"Go,"  he  said,  "bring  me  a  pail  of  water."  He  stood 
watching  Le  Brux  until  she  returned.  "Now,"  he  said, 
"go  out  and  close  the  door  after  you." 

"Don't  be  rough  with  him,"  sighed  the  fat  concierge 
as  she  waddled  toward  the  door,  drying  her  hands  on 
her  apron. 

"Le  Brux,"  said  Leighton,  "Le  Brux!" 

"Yes,  I  hear,"  gasped  the  sculptor,  his  eyes  tight  shut. 

"Le  Brux,  where  is  your  wound  ?" 

"My  wound?  Ha!  my  wound!  He  would  know 
where  is  my  wound !  Here,  here,  my  old  one,  here !" 
He  passed  his  two  hands  over  his  shaking  ribs. 

"Well,  then,"  said  Leighton,  "take  that!"  and  he 
dashed  the  pail  of  water  over  the  prostrate  giant. 

Le  Brux  gasped,  gulped,  and  then  sat  up  on  the 
couch.  He  suddenly  became  very  grave.  Water  trickled 
off  his  chin  upon  his  hairy  chest.  The  soaked  smock 
clung  to  his  arms  and  legs,  accentuating  the  tremendous 
muscles.  "M'sieu'  Letonne,"  he  said,  with  alarming 
calm,  "you  have  committed  an  unpardonable  imperti- 
nence. At  the  same  time  you  have  unwittingly  saved 


THEOUGH   STAINED   GLASS     129 

my  life.  You  have  heard  of  men,  strong  men,  laughing 
themselves  to  death?" 

Leighton,  who  had  seated  himself,  bowed. 

"Well,"  continued  Le  Brux,  "I  can  assure  you  that 
you  and  your  pail  of  slops  arrived  only  in  time  to  avert 
a  tragedy.  That  fact  entitles  itself  to  recognition,  and 
I  am  consequently  going  to  tell  you  all  that  has  hap- 
pened before  we  part — definitely." 

Leighton  bowed  again. 

"As  you  prophesied,  your  boy  won  his  way  into  my 
foolish  heart.  I  used  him  as  a  model  frequently,  and 
let  him  hang  around  me  in  my  idle  moments.  I  even 
gave  him  clay  to  play  with,  and  he  played  with  it  to 
some  effect,  his  great  fault — and  it  is  a  very  great  one 
— being  a  tendency  to  do  things  in  miniature.  I  re- 
proved him  good-naturedly — for  me,  and  he  so  far  im- 
proved as  to  model  a  horse — the  size  of  the  palm  of 
your  hand." 

Leighton  bowed  once  more  in  recognition  of  the 
pause. 

"One  day,"  continued  Le  Brux,  "the  boy  rushed  in 
here  without  knocking.  He  had  something  to  show  me. 
I  did  not  have  the  hardihood  to  rebuke  him,  but,  re- 
membering myself  in  the  quality  of  wet  nurse,  I  was 
dismayed,  for  on  this  very  couch  lay  Cellette — Cellette 
simple,  without  garnishings,  you  understand.  She  was 
lying  on  her  front,  her  chin  in  her  hand,  and  reading 


130     THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

a  book.  I  let  her  read  a  book,  when  I  can,  for  my  own 
peace. 

"Well,  the  boy  showed  me  what  he  had  to  show,  and 
that  gave  me  time  to  collect  my  wits.  I  saw  him  look 
at  Cellette  without  a  tremor,  and  just  as  I  was  decid- 
ing to  take  the  moment  by  the  horns,  he  did  it  for  me. 
'Oh,'  he  said,  'are  you  working  on  her?  Mon  maitre, 
please  let  me  watch !'  A  vile  tongue,  English,  to  under- 
stand, but  it  was  easy  to  read  his  eyes.  I  said,  'Watch 
away,  my  child,'  and  I  continued  to  transmit  Cellette 
to  the  cloud  up  there  in  my  big  group.  The  boy  stood 
around.  When  I  glanced  at  the  model,  his  eyes  fol- 
lowed. When  I  worked,  he  worked  with  me. 

"My  old  one,  you  may  believe  it  or  not,  but  I  felt 
that  boy's  fingers  itching  all  the  time.  Finally,  I 
chucked  a  great  lump  of  clay  upon  the  bench  yonder, 
and  I  said,  'Here,  go  ahead ;  you  model  her,  too.'  Then 

— then — he — he  said "  Le  Brux  showed  signs  of 

choking.  He  controlled  himself,  and  continued — "he 
said,  'I  can't  model  anything,  Maitre,  unless  I  feel  it 
first.'  " 

"Letonne,  I  give  you  my  word  of  honor  that  I  kept 
my  face.  I  not  only  kept  my  face,  but  I  said  to  Cel- 
lette— she  had  n't  so  much  as  looked  up  from  her  book 
— I  said  to  her,  'Cellette,  this  young  sculptor  would  like 
to  model  you,  but  he  says  he  must  feel  you  first.'  Cel- 
lette looked  around  at  that.  You  know  those  gamine 


V 


THEOFGH   STAINED    GLASS     131 

eyes  of  hers  that  are  always  sure  they  '11  never  see  any- 
thing new  in  the  world  ?  But  you  don't.  In  years  Cel- 
lette  is  very  young — long  after  your  time.  Well,  she 
turned  those  eyes  around,  looked  the  boy  over,  and  said, 
'Let  the  babe  feel.'  Then  she  went  back  to  her  book. 

"I  waved  the  boy  to  her,  gravely,  with  a  working  of 
my  fingers  that  was  as  plain  as  French.  It  said,  'The 
lady  says  you  may  feel.'  The  boy  steps  forward,  and 
I  pretend  to  go  on  with  my  work." 

Le  Brux  stopped.  "Excuse  me,  my  friend,"  he  said 
nervously.  "Will  you  kindly  send  for  another  pail  of 
water  ?" 

Leighton  glanced  into  the  pail. 

"There  's  enough  left,"  he  said  impatiently.  "Go  on." 

"Ah,  yes,"  sighed  Le  Brux,  "go  on.  Just  like  that, 
go  on.  Well,  your  boy  went  on.  He  felt  her  head,  her 
arms,  her  shoulders;  you  could  see  his  fingers  seeking 
things  out.  Cellette  is  a  model  born — and  trained.  She 
stood  it  wonderfully  until  he  came  to  the  muscles  of  her 
back.  You  know  how  we  all  like  to  have  our  backs 
scratched,  just  like  dogs  and  cats  ?  Well,  I  do  n't  sup- 
pose Cellette  had  ever  happened  on  just  that  feeling 
before.  It  touched  the  cat  chord.  She  began  to  gurgle 
and — and  wriggle.  'Keep  still,  please,'  says  the  boy, 
very  grave  and  earnest.  And  a  minute  later,  'Keep  still, 
will  you  ?'  Then  he  came  to  her  ribs." 


132     THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Le  Brux's  cheeks  puffed  out,  and  he  showed  other 
signs  of  distress,  but  he  controlled  himself. 

"After  that,"  he  continued,  "things  happened  more 
or  less  at  one  and  the  same  time.  Cellette  giggled  and 
squirmed.  Then  the  boy  got  angry  and  cried,  'Will 
you  keep  still  ?'  and  grabbed  her  by  the  shoulders  and 
shook  her !  Shook  Cellette  till  her  little  head  went  zig- 
zag-zigzag. It  took  her  the  sixteenth  part  of  a  second 
to  get  to  her  feet,  and  when  she  slapped  him  I  myself 
saw  stars.  At  the  same  time  I  saw  her  face,  and  I 
yelled,  'Run,  boy !  Run !'  For  a  second  he  stood  para- 
lyzed with  wonder, — just  long  enough  for  her  to  get  in 
another  slap, — and  then,  just  as  she  was  curving  her 
fingers,  he — he  ran.  Her  nails  only  took  a  strip  out  of 
his  jacket !  Oh !  oh !" 

"Maitre"  cried  Leighton,  tears  crawling  down  his 
cheeks,  "do  n't  you  dare  stop !  Go  on !  Go  on!  Finish 
now  while  you  have  the  strength." 

"Here  they  passed  and  there,"  groaned  Le  Brux, 
pointing  at  bits  of  ruin,  "then  I  yelled,  'Boy,  do  n't  go 
out  of  the  door,  whatever  you  do.  She  '11  follow  sure, 
and  we  '11  never  hear  the  last  of  it.'  Then  the  thought 
came  to  me  that  he  was  the  son  of  my  friend.  I  lifted 
up  the  end  of  the  throne.  He  shot  under  it.  I  let  it 
down  quickly.  I  sat  upon  it.  I  laughed — I " 

Le  Brux  stopped  and  stared.  Leighton,  his  feet  out- 
stretched, his  head  thrown  back,  his  arms  hanging  limp, 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     133 

was  laughing  as  he  had  never  laughed  before.  As  quick 
as  a  cat,  Le  Brux  reached  out  for  the  pail  and  dashed 
its  remaining  contents  in  Leighton's  face. 

"I  cannot  bear  an  obligation,"  he  said  grimly  as 
Leighton  spluttered  and  choked.  "Thou  savedst  my 
life ;  I  save  thine.  How  is  it  you  say  in  English  ?  'One 
good  turn  deserves  another !' ' 

"Maiire,"  said  Leighton,  drying  his  face  and  then  his 
eyes,  "where  is  the  boy  now?  He  's — he  's  not  still 
under  the  throne?" 

"I  do  n't  know  where  he  is,"  said  Le  Brux.  "He  's 
not  under  the  throne.  I  remember,  vaguely,  it  is  true, 
but  I  remember  letting  him  out.  That  was  this  morn- 
ing. Then  I  wired  to  you.  Since  then  I  have  been 
laughing  myself  to  death." 

Leighton  continued  to  wipe  his  eyes,  but  Le  Brux 
had  sobered  down. 

"Talk  about  my  mighty  impersonality  before  the 
nude?"  he  cried.  "Impersonality!  Bah!  Mine?  Let 
me  tell  you  that  for  your  boy  the  nude  in  the  human 
form  does  n't  exist  any  more  than  a  nude  snake,  fish, 
dog,  cat,  or  canary  exists  for  you  or  me.  He  's  the  most 
natural,  practical,  educated  human  being  I  ever  came 
across,  and  there  are  several  thousand  mothers  in  France 
that  would  do  well  to  send  their  jeunes  filles  to  the 
school  that  turned  him  out.  In  other  words,  my  friend, 


134     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

your  boy  is  so  fresh  that  I  have  no  mind  to  be  the  one 
to  watch  him  wither  or  wake  up  or  do  any  of  the  things 
that  Paris  leads  to.  I  wired  for  you  to  take  him  away." 

"We  '11  have  to  find  him  first,"  said  Leighton.  "Let 's 
look  in  his  room." 

Together  they  walked  down  the  hall.  Leighton 
opened  the  door  without  knocking.  He  stood  trans- 
fixed. Le  Brux  stared  over  his  shoulder.  Lewis,  with 
his  back  to  them,  was  working  feverishly  at  the  wet 
clay  piled  on  a  board  laid  across  the  backs  of  two  chairs. 
On  Lewis's  little  bed  lay  Cellette,  front  down,  her  chin 
in  her  hand,  and  reading  a  book. 

"Holy  name  of  ten  thousand  pigs!"  murmured  Le 
Brux. 

Lewis  turned. 

"Why,  Dad !"  he  cried,  "I  am  glad  to  see  you !" 

Leighton's  heart  was  in  the  grip  he  gave  the  boy's 
hand  so  frankly  held  out. 

"Maitre,"  remarked  Cellette  from  the  bed,  "believe 
me  if  you  can:  he  is  still  a  babe." 

"A  babe !"  cried  Le  Brux,  catching  Lewis  with  finger 
and  thumb  and  lifting  him  away  from  the  board.  "I 
should  say  he  is.  Here !"  He  caught  up  chunks  of  wet 
clay  and  hurled  them  at  Lewis's  dainty  model  of  Cell- 
ette. He  started  molding  with  sweeps  of  his  thumb. 
A  gigantic,  but  graceful,  leg  began  to  take  form.  He 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     135 

turned  and  caught  Lewis  again  and  shook  him  till  his 
head  rolled.  "Big!"  he  roared,  thumping  his  chest. 
"Make  it  big — like  me!" 

Leighton  returned  to  London  alone. 


CHAPTER   XXH 

LEWIS'S  life  in  Paris  fell  into  unusual,  but  not 
unhappy,  lines.  It  was  true  that  when  others 
were  around,  Le  Brux  treated  him  as  though  he  were 
a  scullion  or  at  least  a  poor  relative  living  on  his  bounty, 
for  the  great  sculptor  was  in  dread  lest  it  be  noised  about 
that  he  had  at  last  taken  a  pupil.  But  when  they  were 
alone,  he  made  up  for  all  his  brutality  by  a  certain 
tenderness  which  he  was  at  great  pains  to  dissemble. 
He  had  but  one  phrase  of  commendation,  and  it  harped 
back  and  reminded  them  both  of  Leighton.  When  Le 
Brux  was  well  pleased  with  Lewis,  he  would  say,  "My 
son,  I  shall  yet  create  thee." 

It  could  not  be  said  that  master  and  pupil  lived  to- 
gether. Lewis  had  a  room  down  the  hall  and  the  free- 
dom of  the  great  atelier,  but  he  never  ate  with  Le  Brux 
and  never  accompanied  him  on  his  rare  outings.  From 
the  very  first  day  he  had  learned  that  he  must  fend  for 
himself. 

Curiosity  in  all  that  was  new  about  him  sustained 
the  boy  for  a  few  days,  but  as  the  fear  of  getting  lost 
restricted  him  to  the  immediate  neighborhood  of  his 
abode, — a  neighborhood  where  the  sign  "On  parle  an- 

136 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     137 

glais"  never  appeared  in  the  shop  windows,  and  where 
a  restaurateur  would  not  deign  to  speak  English  even 
if  he  knew  it, — he  gradually  became  a  prey  to  the  most 
terrible  of  all  lonelinesses — the  loneliness  of  an  outsider 
in  a  vast,  gay  city. 

At  first  he  did  not  dare  go  into  a  restaurant.  When 
hunger  forced  him,  he  would  enter  a  patisserie,  point 
at  one  thing  and  another,  take  without  question  the 
change  that  was  handed  him,  and  return  to  his  room 
to  eat.  The  neighborhood,  however,  was  blessed  with 
a  series  of  second-hand  book-shops.  One  day  his  eyes 
fell  on  an  English-French  phrase-book.  He  bought  it. 
He  learned  the  meaning  of  the  cabalistic  sign,  "Table 
d'hote.  Diner,  2f."  He  began  to  dine  out. 

In  those  lonely  initiative  weeks  Lewis's  mind  sought 
out  Nadir  and  dwelt  on  it.  He  counted  the  months  he 
had  been  away,  and  was  astounded  by  their  number. 
Never  had  time  seemed  so  long  and  so  short.  He 
longed  to  talk  to  Natalie,  to  tell  her  the  dream  that  had 
seized  upon  him  and  gradually  become  real.  At  the 
little  book-shop  he  bought  ink,  paper,  and  pen,  and 
began  to  write. 

It  was  an  enormous  letter,  for  one  talked  easily  to 
Natalie,  even  on  paper.  At  the  end  he  begged  her  to 
write  to  him,  to  tell  him  all  that  had  happened  at  Nadir, 
if,  indeed,  anything  beyond  her  marriage  had  occurred 
to  mark  the  passing  months.  What  about  the  goats? 


138     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

A  whole  string  of  questions  about  the  goats  followed, 
and  then,  again,  was  she  really  married?  Was  she 
happy  ? 

The  intricacies  of  getting  that  letter  weighed,  prop- 
erly stamped,  and  posted  were  too  much  for  Lewis.  He 
sought  aid  not  from  Le  Brux,  but  from  Cellette.  It 
took  him  a  long  time  to  explain  what  he  wanted.  Cel- 
lette stared  at  him.  She  seemed  so  stupid  about  it  that 
Lewis  felt  like  shaking  her  again,  an  impulse  that,  as- 
sisted by  memory,  he  easily  curbed. 

"But,"  cried  Cellette  at  last,  "it  is  so  easy — so  sim- 
ple! You  go  to  the  post,  you  say,  'Kindly  weigh  this 
letter,'  you  ask  how  much  to  put  on  it,  you  buy  the 
stamps,  you  affix  them,  you  drop  the  letter  in  the  slot. 
Voila!"  She  smiled  and  started  off. 

Lewis  reached  out  one  arm  and  barred  her  way. 

"Yes,  yes,"  he  stammered,  "voila,  of  course."  A 
vague  recollection  of  his  father  taming  Le  Brux  with 
a  dinner  came  to  his  aid.  He  explained  to  Cellette  that 
if  she  would  post  the  letter  for  him,  he  would  be  pleased 
to  take  her  to  dinner. 

Then  Cellette  understood  in  her  own  way. 

"Ah,"  she  cried  brightly,  "you  make  excuses  to  ask 
me  to  dine,  eh  ?  That  is  delicate.  It  is  gallant.  I  am 
charmed.  Let  us  go." 

She  hung  on  his  arm.  She  chatted.  She  never  waited 
for  an  answer.  Together  they  went  to  the  post.  People 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     139 

glanced  at  them  and  smiled,  some  nodded ;  but  Cellette's 
face  was  upturned  toward  Lewis's.  She  saw  no  one 
else.  It  was  his  evening. 

Gradually  it  dawned  upon  her  that  Lewis  was  really 
helpless  and  terribly  alone.  In  that  moment  she  took 
charge  of  him  as  a  duck  takes  charge  of  an  orphaned 
chick.  On  succeeding  evenings  she  led  him  to  the  water, 
but  she  did  not  try  to  make  him  swim. 

Parents  still  comfort  themselves  with  the  illusion  that 
they  can  choose  safe  guardians  for  their  young.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  guardians  of  innocence  are  allotted  by 
Fate.  When  Fate  is  kind,  she  allots  the  extremes,  a 
guardian  who  has  never  felt  a  sensation  or  one  who 
has  tired  of  all  sensations.  The  latter  adds  wisdom 
to  innocence,  subtracts  it  from  bliss,  and — becomes  an 
ideal. 

Fate  was  kind  to  Lewis  in  handing  him  over  to  Cel- 
lette  at  the  tragic  age.  Nature  had  shown  him  much; 
Cellette  showed  him  the  rest.  She  took  him  as  a  pas- 
senger through  all  the  side-shows  of  life.  She  was  tired 
of  payments  in  flesh  and  blood.  She  found  her  recom- 
pense in  teaching  him  how  to  talk,  walk,  eat,  take  pleas- 
ure in  a  penny  ride  on  a  river  boat  or  on  top  of  a  bus, 
and  in  spending  his  entire  allowance  to  their  best  joint 
profit. 

In  return  Lewis  received  many  a  boon.  He  was  no 
longer  alone.  He  was  introduced  as  an  equal  to  the 


140     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

haunts  of  the  gay  world  of  embryonic  art — the  only 
world  that  has  ever  solved  the  problem  of  being  gay 
without  money.  From  the  first  he  was  assumed  to  be- 
long to  Cellette.  How  much  of  the  assault,  the  jeers, 
the  buffoonery,  the  downright  evil  of  initiation,  he  was 
saved  by  this  assumption  he  never  knew.  Cellette  knew, 
but  her  tongue  was  held  by  shame.  All  her  training 
had  taught  her  to  be  ashamed  of  "being  good."  If  ever 
the  secret  of  their  astounding  innocence  had  got  out, 
professional  pride  would  have  forced  her  to  ruin  Lewis, 
body  and  soul,  without  a  moment's  hesitation. 

Lewis  also  learned  French — a  French  that  rippled 
along  mostly  over  shallows,  but  that  had  deep  pools 
of  art  technic,  and  occasionally  flew  up  and  slapped 
you  in  the  face  with  a  fleck  of  well-aimed  argot. 

Weeks,  months,  passed  before  Leighton  appeared  on 
the  scene,  summoned  by  a  scribbled  note  from  Le  Brux. 
When  greetings  were  over,  Leighton  asked: 

"Well,  what  is  it  this  time?  How  is  the  boy  get- 
ting along?  Is  he  going  to  be  a  sculptor?" 

"You  are  wise  to  ask  all  your  questions  at  once," 
said  Le  Brux.  "You  know  I  shall  talk  just  as  I  please. 
Your  boy,  just  as  you  said  he  would,  has  attacked  me 
in  the  heart.  He  is  a  most  entertaining  babe.  I  am 
no  longer  wet  nurse.  Somebody  with  the  attributes  has 
supplanted  me — Gellette." 

"H — m — m !"  said  Leighton. 


THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS     141 

Le  Brux  held  up  a  ponderous  hand. 

"Not  too  fast,"  he  said.  "The  lady  assures  me  the 
babe  is  still  on  the  bottle.  Such  being  the  case,  I  sent 
for  you.  They  are  inseparable.  They  have  put  off 
falling  in  love  so  long  that,  when  they  do,  it  will  prove 
a  catastrophe  for  one  of  them.  Take  him  away  for  a 
while.  Distort  his  concentrated  point  of  view." 

"That  'a  a  good  idea,"  said  Leighton.  "Perhaps  I 
will." 

"As  for  his  work "  Le  Brux  stepped  to  the  door 

and  locked  it.  "I  would  n't  have  him  catch  us  looking 
at  it  for  anything."  He  lifted  the  damp  cloth  from 
Lewis's  latest  bit  of  modeling,  two  tense  hands,  long 
fingers  curved  like  talons,  thumbs  bent  in.  They  flashed 
to  the  eye  the  impression  of  terrific  action. 

Leighton  gazed  long  at  the  hands. 

"So,"  he  said,  "somewhere  the  boy  has  seen  a  mur- 
der." 

"Ha!"  cried  Le  Brux.  "You  see  it?  You  see  it? 
He  has  not  troubled  to  put  the  throat  within  that  grip, 
but  it  's  there.  Ah,  it  ?s  there !  I  could  see  it.  You 
see  it.  Presto !  everybody  will  see  it."  He  replaced  the 
cloth. 

"In  a  couple  of  years,"  he  went  on,  "my  work  will 
be  done.  Let  him  show  nothing,  know  nothing,  till 
then." 


CHAPTER   XXIII 

IF  it  's  a  fine  day  tomorrow,"  said  Leighton  that 
evening  to  Lewis,  "we  '11  spend  it  in  the  country. 
Ever  been  in  the  country  around  here  ?" 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"I  don't  believe  Cellette  knows  anything  about  the 
country.  It  would  be  a  great  thing,  Dad,  if  we  could 
take  her  with  us.  She  's  shown  me  around  a  lot.  I  'd 
—I  'd  like  to." 

Leighton  suppressed  a  grimace. 

"Why  not?"  he  replied  cheerfully. 

The  next  day  was  fine  and  hot.  Leighton  decided  to 
take  a  chance  on  innovation,  and  revisit  a  quiet  stretch 
on  the  Marne.  It  was  rather  a  journey  to  get  there, 
but  from  the  moment  the  three  were  settled  in  their 
third-class  carriage  time  took  to  wing.  As  he  listened 
to  Lewis's  and  Cellette's  chatter,  the  years  rolled  back 
for  Leighton.  He  became  suddenly  young.  Lewis  felt 
it.  For  the  second  time  he  had  the  delightful  sensa- 
tion of  stumbling  across  a  brother  in  his  father. 

Cellette  felt  it,  too.  When  they  left  the  station  and 
started  down  the  cool,  damp  road  to  the  river,  she  linked 
a  hand  in  the  arm  of  each  of  her  laughing  companions, 

142 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     143 

urged  them  to  a  run,  and  then  picked  up  her  little  feet 
for  mighty  leaps  of  twenty  yards  at  a  time.  "Ah"  she 
cried,  "cest  joli,  d'etre  trois  enfants!" 

How  strange  the  earth  smelt !  She  insisted  on  stop- 
ping and  snuffling  at  every  odor.  New-mown  grass; 
freshly  turned  loam;  a  stack  of  straw,  packed  too  wet 
and  left  to  ruin;  dry  leaves  burning  under  the  hot  sun 
into  a  sort  of  dull  incense — all  had  their  message  for 
her.  Even  of  the  country  Cellette  had  a  dim  memory 
tucked  away  in  her  store  of  experience. 

They  came  to  the  river.  From  a  farmer  they  hired 
a  boat.  Cellette  wanted  to  drift  down  with  the  stream, 
but  Leighton  shook  his  head.  "No,  my  dear,  a  day  on 
the  river  is  like  life:  one  should  leave  the  quiet,  lazy 
drifting  till  the  end." 

Leighton  rowed,  and  then  Lewis.  They  held  Cel- 
lette's  hands  on  the  oars  and  she  tried  to  row,  but  not 
for  long.  She  said  that  by  her  faith  it  was  harder 
than  washing  somebody  else's  clothes. 

They  chose  the  shade  of  a  great  beech  for  their  pic- 
nic-ground. Cellette  ordered  them  to  one  side,  and 
started  to  unpack  the  lunch-basket  that  had  come  with 
Leighton  from  his  hotel.  As  each  item  was  revealed 
she  cast  a  sidelong  glance  at  Leighton. 

"My  old  one,"  she  said  to  him  when  all  was  prop- 
erly laid  out,  "do  not  play  at  youth  and  innocence  any 
longer.  It  takes  an  old  sinner  to  order  such  a  breakfast." 


144     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

It  was  a  gay  meal  and  a  good  one,  and,  like  all  good 
meals,  led  to  drowsiness.  Cellette  made  a  pillow  of 
Lewis's  coat  and  slept.  The  afternoon  was  very  hot. 
Leighton  finished  his  second  cigar,  and  then  tapped 
Lewis  on  the  shoulder.  They  slipped  beyond  the  screen 
of  the  low-limbed  beech,  stripped,  and  stole  into  the 
river. 

At  the  first  thoughtless  splash  Cellette  sprang  to  her 
feet. 

"Ah !"  she  cried,  her  eyes  lighting,  "you  bathe,  Ueinf 
She  started  undoing  her  bodice. 

Leighton  stared  at  her  from  the  water.  "What  do 
you  do  ?"  he  cried  in  rapid  French.  "You  cannot 
bathe.  I  won't  allow  it." 

Cellette  paused  in  sheer  amazement  that  any  one 
should  think  there  was  anything  she  could  not  do.  Then 
deliberately  she  continued  undoing  hooks. 

"Why  can't  I  bathe?"  she  asked  out  of  courtesy  or 
merely  because  she  knew  the  value  of  keeping  up  a  con- 
versation. 

"You  can't  bathe,"  said  Leighton,  desperately,  "be- 
cause you  are  too  tender,  too  delicate.  These  waters 
are — miasmic.  They  are  full  of  snakes,  too.  It  was 
just  now  that  I  stepped  on  one." 

"Snakes,  eh  ?"  said  Cellette,  pausing  again.  "I  do  n't 
believe  you.  But — snakes !"  She  shuddered,  and  then 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     145 

looked  as  though  she  were  going  to  cry  with  disappoint- 
ment. 

"Don't  you  mind  just  this  once,  Cellette/'  cried 
Lewis,  blowing  like  a  walrus  as  he  held  his  place  against 
the  current.  "We'll  come  alone  some  time." 

Cellette  dried  the  perspiration  from  her  short  upper 
lip  with  a  little  cotton  handkerchief. 

"Mon  dieu,  but  men  are  selfish !"  she  remarked. 

Once  they  were  in  the  boat  again,  drifting  slowly 
down  the  shadowy  river,  she  forgot  her  pet,  turned 
suddenly  gay,  and  began  to  sing  songs  that  were  as  for- 
eign to  that  still  sunset  scene  as  was  Cellette  herself  to 
a  dairy;  Lewis  had  heard  them  before.  He  looked 
upon  them  merely  as  one  of  Cellette's  moods,  but  they 
brought  a  twisted  smile  to  Leighton's  lips.  He  glanced 
at  the  pompous,  indignant  setting  sun  and  winked.  The 
sun  did  not  wink  back;  he  was  surly. 

In  the  train,  Cellette,  tired  and  happy,  went  to  sleep. 
Her  head  fell  on  Leighton's  shoulder.  With  dexterous 
fingers  he  took  off  her  hat  and  laid  it  aside,  then  he 
looked  at  Lewis  shrewdly.  But  Lewis  showed  no  signs 
of  jealousy.  He  merely  laughed  silently  and  whispered, 
"Is  n't  she  a  funny  ?" 

They  began  to  talk.  Leighton  told  Lewis  he  was  glad 
that  he  had  worked  steadily  all  these  months,  that  Le 
Brux  spoke  well  of  his  work,  but  thought  a  rest  would 
help  it  and  him. 


146    THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"What  do  you  say/'  he  went  on,  "to  a  little  trip  all  by 
ourselves  again?" 

"It  would  be  splendid,"  said  Lewis,  eagerly.  Then, 
after  a  pause :  "It  would  be  fun  if  we  could  take  Cel- 
lette  along,  too.  She  'd  like  it  a  lot,  I  know." 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton,  dryly,  "I  do  n't  doubt  she 
would."  He  seemed  to  ponder  over  the  point.  "K~o," 
he  said  finally,  "it  would  n't  do.  What  I  propose  is  a 
man's  trip — good  stiff  walking.  We  could  strike  off 
through  Metz  and  Kaiserslautern,  hit  the  Rhine  valley 
somewhere  about  Durkheim,  pass  through  Mannheim 
with  our  eyes  shut,  and  get  to  Heidelberg  and  the 
JSTeckar.  Then  we  could  float  down  the  Rhine  into  Hol- 
land. That  's  the  toy-country  of  the  world.  Great 
place  to  make  you  smile." 

Lewis's  eyes  watered. 

"When — when  shall  we  start?" 

"We  '11  start  to  start  to-morrow,"  said  Leighton. 
"We  Ve  got  to  outfit,  you  know." 

Two  days  later  they  were  ready.  Cellette  kissed 
them  both  good-by.  Leighton  gave  her  a  pretty  trinket, 
a  heavy  gold  locket  on  a  chain.  She  glanced  up  side- 
wise  at  him  through  half-closed  eyes. 

"What  's  this  T'  she  asked  in  the  tone  of  the  woman 
who  knows  she  must  always  pay. 

"Just  a  little  nothing  from  Lewis,"  said  Leighton. 
"Something  to  remember  him  by." 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    147 

"So,"  said  Cellette,  gravely.  "I  understand.  He  will 
not  come  back.  It  is  well." 

Leighton  patted  her  shoulder. 

"You  are  shrewd,"  he  said.  Then  he  added,  with 
a  smile :  "Too  shrewd.  He  will  he  back  in  two  months." 

A  fiacre  carried  them  beyond  the  fortifications.  The 
cabman  smiled  at  the  generous  drink-money  Leighton 
gave  him,  spit  on  it,  and  then  sat  and  watched  father 
and  son  as  they  stepped  lightly  off  up  the  broad  high- 
way. "Eh!"  he  called,  choking  down  the  curses  with 
which  he  usually  parted  from  his  fares,  "good  luck! 
Eollow  the  sun  around  the  earth.  It  will  bring  you 
back." 

Leighton  half  turned,  and  waved  his  arm.  Then  they 
settled  down  to  the  business  of  walking.  They  dropped 
into  their  place  as  a  familiar  part  of  the  open  road  of 
only  a  very  few  years  ago,  for  they  were  dressed  in  the 
orthodox  style :  knickerbockers ;  woolen  stockings ;  heavy 
footwear ;  short  jackets ;  packs,  such  as  once  the  school- 
boy used  for  books ;  and  double-peaked  caps. 

Shades  of  a  bygone  day,  where  do  you  skulk  ?  Have 
you  been  driven, 

Up,  up,  the  stony  causeway  to  the  mists  above  the  glare, 
Where  the  smell  of  browsing  cattle  drowns  the  petrol  in 
the  air? 


CHAPTEE   XXIV 

JUST  before  they  left  Paris  a  letter  had  come  for 
Lewis — a  big,  official  envelop,  unstamped.  He 
tore  it  open,  full  of  curiosity  and  wonder.  Out  fell 
a  fat  inclosure.  Lewis  picked  it  up  and  stared.  It 
is  always  a  shock  to  see  your  own  handwriting  months 
after  you  have  sent  it  off  on  a  long  journey.  Here  was 
his  own  handwriting  on  a  very  soiled  envelop,  plastered 
over  with  postmarks.  How  quaint  was  the  superscrip- 
tion, how  eloquent  the  distant  dates  of  the  postmarks! 
"For  Natalie.  At  the  Ranch  of  Dom  Francisco,  on  the 
Road  to  Oeiras,  in  the  Province  of  Ceara,  Brazil." 

The  envelop  had  been  cut  open.  Lewis  took  out  the 
many  sheets  and  searched  them  for  a  sign.  None  was 
there.  He  looked  again  at  the  envelop.  Across  it  was 
stamped  a  notice  of  non-delivery  on  account  of  deficient 
address.  Then  his  eyes  fell  on  faint  writing  in  pencil 
under  a  postmark.  He  recognized  the  halting  hand- 
writing of  Dom  Francisco's  eldest  girl.  "She  is  gone," 
she  had  written.  Nothing  more. 

"Gone?"  questioned  Lewis.  "Gone  where?  Where 
could  Natalie  go?"  He  read  parts  of  his  letter  over, 

148 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     149 

and  blushed  at  his  enthusiasms  of  almost  a  year  ago. 
Almost  a  year !  Leighton  called  him.  He  tore  up  the 
letter  and  threw  it  away.  It  was  time  to  start.  Then 
had  come  the  good-by  to  Cellette,  and  after  that  the 
wonders  of  the  road  had  held  his  mind  in  a  constantly 
renewing  grip.  They  still  held  it. 

Leighton  was  beyond  being  a  guide.  He  was  a  com- 
panion. When  he  could,  he  avoided  big  cities  and 
monuments.  He  loved  to  stop  for  the  night  at  way- 
side inns  where  the  accommodations  were  meager,  but 
ample  opportunity  was  given  for  a  friendly  chat  with 
the  hostess  cook.  And  if  the  inn  was  one  of  those  homely 
evening  meeting-places  for  old  folks,  he  would  say: 

"Lew,  no  country  wears  its  heart  on  its  sleeve,  but 
'way  inside.  Let  us  live  here  a  little  while  and  feel 
the  pulse  of  France." 

When  they  crossed  the  border,  he  sat  down  under 
the  first  shade  tree  and  made  Lewis  sit  facing  him. 

"This,"  he  said  gravely,  "is  an  eventful  moment. 
You  have  just  entered  a  strange  country  where  cooks 
have  been  known  to  fry  a  steak  and  live.  There  are 
people  that  eat  the  steaks  and  live.  It  is  a  wonderful 
country.  Their  cooks  are  also  generally  ignorant  of 
the  axiomatic  mission  of  a  dripping-pan,  as  soggy  fowls 
will  prove  to  you.  But  what  we  lose  in  pleasing  alimen- 
tation, we  make  up  in  scenery  and  food  for  thought. 
Collectively,  this  is  the  greatest  people  on  earth;  indi- 


150     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

vidually,  the  smallest.  Their  national  life  is  the  most 
communal,  the  best  regulated,  the  nearest  socialistic  of 
any  in  the  world,  and — they  live  it  by  the  inch." 

One  afternoon,  after  a  long  climb  through  an  odorous 
forest  of  red-stemmed  pines,  with  green-black  tops 
stretching  for  miles  and  miles  in  an  unbroken  canopy, 
they  came  out  upon  a  broad  view  that  entranced  with 
its  sense  of  illusion.  Cities,  like  bunched  cattle,  dotted 
the  vast  plain.  Space  and  the  wide,  unhindered  sweep 
of  the  eye  reduced  their  greatness  to  the  dimensions  of 
toy-land. 

Leighton  and  Lewis  stood  long  in  silence,  then  they 
started  down  the  road  that  clung  to  the  steep  incline. 
On  the  left  it  was  overhung  by  the  forest ;  on  the  right, 
earth  fell  suddenly  away  in  a  wooded  precipice.  As 
the  highway  clung  to  the  mountain-side,  so  did  quaint 
villages  cling  to  the  highway.  They  came  to  an  old 
Gasthaus,  the  hinder  end  of  which  was  buttressed  over 
the  brink  of  the  valley. 

Here  they  stopped.  Their  big,  square  room,  the  only 
guest-chamber  of  the  little  inn,  hung  in  air  high  above 
the  jumbled  roofs  of  Diirkheim.  To  the  right,  the  valley 
split  to  form  a  niche  for  a  beetling,  ruined  castle.  Far 
out  on  the  plain  the  lights  of  Darmstadt  and  Mannheim 
began  to  blink.  Beyond  and  above  them  Heidelberg  sig- 
naled faintly  from  the  opposing  hills. 

The   room   shared   its   aery  with   a   broad,   square 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     151 

veranda,  trellised  and  vine-covered.  Here  were  tables 
and  chairs,  and  here  Leighton  and  Lewis  dined.  Be- 
fore they  had  finished  their  meal,  two  groups  had  formed 
about  separate  tables.  One  was  of  old  men,  white- 
haired,  white-bearded,  each  with  his  pipe  and  a  long 
mug  of  beer.  The  other  was  of  women.  They,  too, 
were  old,  white-haired.  Their  faces  were  not  hard,  like 
the  men's,  but  filled  with  a  withered  motherliness.  The 
men  eyed  the  two  foreigners  distrustfully  as  though 
they  hung  like  a  cloud  over  the  accustomed  peace  of  that 
informal  village  gathering. 

"All  old,  eh?"  said  Leighton  to  Lewis  with  a  nod. 
"And  sour.  Want  to  see  them  wake  up?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis. 

The  woman  who  served  them  was  young  by  compari- 
son with  the  rest.  Leighton  had  discovered  that  she 
was  an  Alsatian,  and  had  profited  thereby  in  the  or- 
dering of  his  dinner.  She  was  the  daughter-in-law  of 
the  old  couple  that  owned  the  inn.  He  turned  to  her 
and  said  in  French,  so  that  Lewis  could  understand: 

"Smile  but  once,  dear  lady.  You  serve  us  as  though 
we  were  Britishers." 

The  woman  turned  quickly. 

"And  are  you  not  Britishers  ?" 

"No,"  said  Leighton;  "Americans." 

"So!"  cried  the  woman,  her  face  brightening.  She 
turned  to  the  two  listening  groups.  "They  are  not  Eng- 


152     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

lish,  after  all,"  she  called  gaily.  "They  are  Americans 
— Americans  of  New  York !" 

There  was  an  instant  change  of  the  social  atmosphere, 
a  buzz  of  eager  talk.  The  old  men  and  the  old  women 
drew  near.  Then  came  shy,  but  eager,  questions.  Hans, 
Fritz,  Anna  were  in  New  York.  Could  Leighton  give 
any  news  of  them  ?  Each  had  his  little  pathetically  con- 
fident cry  for  news  of  son  or  daughter,  and  Leighton's 
personal  acquaintance,  as  an  American,  was  taken  to 
range  from  Toronto  to  Buenos  Aires. 

Leighton  treated  them  like  children ;  laughed  at  them, 
and  then  described  gravely  in  simple  words  the  dis- 
tances of  the  New  World,  the  size  and  the  turmoil  of 
its  cities. 

"Your  children  are  young  and  strong,"  he  added,  not- 
ing their  wistful  eyes;  "they  can  stand  it.  But  you — 
you  old  folks — are  much  better  off  here." 

"And  yet,"  said  an  old  woman,  with  longing  in  her 
pale  eyes,  "I  have  stood  many  things." 

Leighton  turned  to  Lewis. 

"All  old,  eh?"  he  repeated.  "Young  ones  all  gone. 
Do  you  remember  what  I  said  about  this  being  the  best- 
regulated  state  on  earth?" 

Lewis  nodded. 

"Well,"  continued  Leighton,  "a  perfectly  regulated 
state  is  a  fine  thing,  a  great  thing  for  humanity.  It 
has  only  one  fault :  nobody  wants  to  live  in  it." 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     153 

Two  days  later  they  reached  Heidelberg  and,  on  the 
day  following,  climbed  the  mountain  to  the  Konigstuhl. 
They  stood  on  the  top  of  the  tower  and  gazed  on  such 
a  sight  as  Lewis  had  never  seen.  Here  were  no  endless 
sands  and  thorn-trees,  no  lonely  reaches,  no  tropic  glare. 
All  was  river  and  wooded  glade,  harvest  and  harvesters, 
spires  above  knotted  groups  of  houses,  castle,  and  hovel. 
Here  and  there  and  everywhere,  still  spirals  of  smoke 
hung  above  the  abodes  of  men.  It  was  like  a  vision  of 
peace  and  plenty  from  the  Bible. 

Lewis  was  surprised  to  find  that  his  father  was  not 
looking  at  the  scene.  Leighton  was  bending  over  such 
a  dial  as  no  other  spot  on  earth  could  boast.  Its  radi- 
ating spokes  of  varying  lengths  pointed  to  a  hundred 
places,  almost  within  the  range  of  sight — names  famous 
in  song  and  story,  in  peace  and  in  war.  Leighton  read 
them  out,  name  after  name.  He  glanced  at  Lewis's  puz- 
zled face. 

"They  mean  nothing  to  you  ?"  he  asked. 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"So  you  're  not  quite  educated,  after  all,"  said  Leigh- 
ton. 

They  descended  almost  at  a  run  to  the  gardens  be- 
hind the  Schloss.  As  they  reached  them  a  long  string  of 
carriages  drove  up  from  the  town.  They  were  full  of 
tourists,  many  of  whom  wore  the  enameled  flag  of  the 


United  States  in  their  buttonholes.  Some  of  the  women 
carried  little  red,  white,  and  blue  silk  flags. 

Lewis  saw  his  father  wince. 

"Dad,"  he  asked,  "are  they  Americans  ?" 

"Yes,  boy,"  said  Leighton.  "Do  you  remember  what 
I  told  you  about  the  evanescent  spirit  in  art  ?" 

Lewis  nodded. 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "a  beloved  flag  has  an  evan- 
escent spirit,  too.  One  should  n't  finger  carelessly  the 
image  one  would  adore.  That 's  why  I  winced  just  now. 
Collectively,  we  Americans  have  never  lowered  the  Stars 
and  Stripes,  but  individually  we  do  it  pretty  often." 
Then  he  threw  up  his  head  and  smiled.  "After  all, 
there  's  a  bright  side  even  to  blatant  patriotism.  A  na- 
tion can  put  up  with  every  form  of  devotion  so  long  as 
it  gets  it  from  all." 

"But,  Dad,"  said  Lewis,  "I  thought  all  American 
women  were  beautiful." 

"So  they  are,"  said  Leighton,  with  a  laugh.  "When 
you  stop  believing  tKat,  you  stop  being  an  American. 
All  American  women  are  beautiful — some  outside,  and 
the  rest  inside." 

"Why  don't  you  take  me  to  the  States  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

Leighton  turned  around. 

"How  old  are  you?" 

"Twenty,"  said  Lewis. 

"I  '11  take  you,"  said  Leighton,  "when  you  are  old 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    155 

enough  to  see  the  States.  It  takes  a  certain  amount  of 
philosophy  nowadays  to  understand  your  country — and 
mine.  Of  all  the  nations  in  the  world,  we  Americans 
see  ourselves  least  as  others  see  us.  We  have  a  na- 
tional vanity  that  keeps  us  from  studying  a  looking- 
glass.  That  's  a  paradox,"  said  Leighton,  smiling  at 
Lewis's  puzzled  look.  "A  paradox,"  he  continued,  "is  a 
verity  the  unpleasant  truth  of  which  is  veiled." 

"Anyway,  I  should  like  to  go  to  the  States,"  said 
Lewis. 

"Just  now,"  said  Leighton,  "our  country  is  traveling 
the  universal  road  of  commercialism,  but  it  's  traveling 
fast.  When  it  gets  to  the  end  of  the  road,  it  will  be  an 
interesting  country." 


CHAPTEK   XXV 

THREE  years  later,  with  the  approval  of  Le  Brux, 
Lewis  exhibited  the  "Startled  Woman."  He  did 
not  name  it.  It  named  itself.  There  was  no  single  re- 
markable trait  in  the  handling  of  the  life-size  nude 
figure  beyond  its  triumph  as  a  whole — its  sure  impres- 
sion of  alarm. 

Leighton  came  to  Paris  for  his  son's  debut.  When  he 
saw  the  statue,  he  said : 

"It  is  not  great.  You  are  not  old  enough  for  that. 
But  it  will  be  a  success,  probably  a  sensation.  What 
else  have  you  done?" 

All  the  modeling  that  Lewis  had  accumulated  in  the 
three  years  of  his  apprenticeship  was  passed  in  review. 
Leighton  scarcely  looked  at  the  casts.  He  kept  his  eyes 
on  Le  Brux's  face  and  measured  his  changing  expres- 
sion. 

"Is  that  all  ?"  he  asked. 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis. 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "I  suggest  we  destroy  the  lot 
What  do  you  say,  Le  Brux  ?" 

156 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     157 

Le  Brux  raised  his  bushy  eyebrows,  shrugged  his 
shoulders,  and  threw  out  his  hands. 

"Eh,"  he  grunted,  "it  is  for  the  boy  to  say.  Has  he 
the  courage?  They  are  his  offspring." 

The  two  men  stood  and  looked  at  Lewis.  His  eyes 
passed  from  them  to  his  work  and  back  again  to  Leigh- 
ton's  face. 

"You  are  my  father,"  he  said. 

"Come  on,"  cried  Leighton,  without  a  moment's  hesi- 
tation, "let  us  all  join  in  the  slaughter.  Just  remember, 
boy,  that  it  's  no  more  cruel  to  kill  your  young  than  to 
sell  them  into  slavery." 

Three  days  later  all  of  Paris  that  counts  was  talk- 
ing of  the  "Startled  Woman."  The  name  of  Leighton 
fils  was  in  many  mouths  and  in  almost  as  many  printed 
paragraphs. 

"Leighton  fils  I"  cried  Lewis.    Why  fils?" 

"Paris  has  a  long  memory  for  art,  my  boy,"  said 
Leighton.  "Before  I  learned  that  I  could  never  reach 
the  heights,  I  raised  a  small  monument  on  a  foot:hill. 
They  have  n't  forgotten  it,  these  critics  who  never  die." 

Lewis  was  assailed  by  dealers.  They  offered  him 
prices  that  seemed  to  him  fabulous.  But  Leighton  lis- 
tened calmly  and  said,  "Wait."  The  longer  they  waited, 
the  higher  climbed  the  rival  dealers.  At  last  came  an 
official  envelop.  "Ah,"  said  Leighton,  before  Lewis 
had  opened  it,  "it  has  come." 


158     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

It  was  an  offer  from  the  state.  It  was  lower  than  the 
least  of  the  dealers'  bids.  "That's  the  prize  offer,  boy," 
said  Leighton.  "Take  it." 

They  went  back  to  London  together.  Leighton  helped 
Lewis  search  for  a  studio.  They  examined  many  places, 
pleasant  and  unpleasant.  Finally  Lewis  settled  on  a 
great,  bare,  loft-like  room  within  a  few  minutes'  walk 
of  the  flat.  "This  will  do,"  he  said. 

"Why?"  asked  Leighton. 

"Space,"  said  Lewis.  "Le  Brux  taught  me  that.  One 
must  have  space  to  see  big." 

While  they  were  still  busy  fitting  up  the  atelier  a 
note  came  to  Lewis  from  Lady  Deri.  She  told  him  to 
come  and  see  her  at  once,  to  bring  all  his  clippings  on 
the  "Startled  Woman,"  and  a  photograph  that  would 
do  the  lady  more  justice  than  had  the  newspaper  prints. 

When  Lewis  entered  Lady  Deri's  room  of  light,  it 
seemed  to  him  that  he  had  not  been  away  from  London 
for  a  day.  The  room  was  unchanged.  Lady  Deri  was 
unchanged.  She  did  not  rise.  She  held  out  her  hand, 
and  Lewis  raised  her  fingers  to  his  lips. 

"How  well  you  do  it,  Lew!"  she  said.     "Sit  down." 

He  sat  down  and  showed  her  a  photograph  of  his 
work.  She  looked  at  it  long.  For  an  instant  her  world- 
liness  dropped  from  her.  She  glanced  shrewdly  at 
Lewis's  face.  He  met  her  eyes  frankly.  Then  she 
tossed  the  picture  aside. 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     159 

"You  are  a  nice  boy,"  sHe  said  lightly.  "I  think  I  '11 
give  a  little  dinner  for  you.  This  time  your  dad  won't 
object." 

"I  hope  not,"  said  Lewis,  smiling.  "I  'm  bigger  than 
he  is  now." 

Both  laughed,  and  then  chatted  until  Leighton  came 
in  to  join  them  at  tea.  Lady  Deri  told  him  of  the  din- 
ner. He  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  asked  when  it  was 
to  be. 

"Don't  look  so  bored,"  said  Lady  Deri.  "I  '11  get  Old 
Ivory  to  come,  if  you  're  coming.  You  two  always  cre- 
ate an  atmosphere  within  an  atmosphere  where  you  can 
breathe  the  kind  of  air  you  like." 

Leighton  smiled. 

"It  's  a  funny  thing,"  he  said.  "When  Ivory  and  I 
meet  casually,  we  simply  nod  as  though  we  'd  never 
shared  each  other's  tents ;  but  when  we  are  both  caught 
out  in  society,  we  fly  together  and  hobnob  like  long-lost 
brothers.  We  've  made  three  trips  together.  Every  one 
of  'em  was  planned  at  some  ultra  dinner  incrusted  with 
hothouse  flowers  and  hothouse  women." 

"Thanks,"  said  Lady  Deri. 

Lewis  might  have  been  bored  by  that  first  formal 
dinner  if  he  had  known  the  difference  between  women 
grown  under  glass  and  women  grown  in  the  open.  But 
he  did  n't.  With  the  exception  of  Ann  Leighton, 
mammy,  and  Natalie,  who  were  not  women  at  all  so 


160     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

much  as  part  and  parcel  of  his  own  fiber,  women  were 
just  women.  He  treated  them  all  alike,  and  with  a 
gallant  nonchalance  that  astounded  his  two  neighbors, 
Lady  Blanche  Trevoy  and  the  Hon.  Violet  Materlin,  ac- 
customed as  they  were  to  find  youths  of  his  age  stupidly 
callow  or  at  best,  in  their  innocence,  mildly  exciting. 
Leighton,  seated  at  Helene's  left,  watched  Lewis  curi- 
ously. 

"They  've  taken  to  him,"  said  Helene. 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton.  "Nothing  wins  a  woman  of 
the  world  so  quickly  as  the  unexpected.  The  unex- 
pected adds  to  the  ancient  lure  of  curiosity  the  touch  of 
tartness  that  gives  life  to  a  jaded  palate.  Satiated 
women  are  the  most  grateful  for  such  a  fillip,  and  once 
a  woman  's  grateful,  she  's  generous.  A  generous  man 
will  give  a  beggar  a  copper,  but  a  generous  woman  will 
give  away  all  her  coppers,  and  throw  in  herself  for 
good  measure." 

"When  you  have  to  try  to  be  clever,  Glen,  you  're  a 
bore,"  remarked  Helene. 

"I  'm  not  trying  to  be  clever,"  said  Leighton.  "There 
's  a  battle  going  on  over  there,  and  I  was  merely  throw- 
ing light  on  it." 

The  battle  was  worth  watching.  The  two  young 
women  were  as  dissimilar  as  beauty  can  be.  Both  had 
all  the  charms  of  well-nurtured  and  well-cared-for  flesh. 
Splendid  necks  and  shoulders,  plenty  of  their  own  hair, 


THBOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    161 

lovely  contour  of  face,  practice  in  the  use  of  the  lot, 
were  theirs  in  common.  But  Vi  was  dark,  still,  and 
long  of  limb.  Blanche  was  blonde,  vivacious,  and  com- 
pact without  being  in  the  least  heavy. 

Vi  spoke  slowly.  Even  for  an  English  woman  she 
had  a  low  voice.  It  was  a  voice  of  peculiar  power.  One 
always  waited  for  it  to  finish.  Vi  knew  its  power. 
She  tormented  her  opponents  by  drawling.  Blanche 
also  spoke  softly,  but  at  will  she  could  make  her  words 
scratch  like  the  sharp  claws  of  a  kitten. 

"And  how  did  you  ever  get  the  model  to  take  that 
startled  pose?"  Blanche  was  asking  Lewis. 

"That  's  where  the  luck  came  in,"  said  Lewis,  smil- 
ing; "and  the  luck  is  what  keeps  the  work  from  being 
great." 

"What  do  you  mean  ?" 

"Well,"  said  Lewis,  "Le  Brux  says  that  luck  often 
leads  to  success,  never  to  greatness." 

"And  how  did  luck  come  in?"  drawled  Vi. 

Lewis  smiled  again. 

"I  '11  tell  you,"  he  said.  "The  model  is  an  old  pal 
of  mine.  One  day  we  were  bathing  in  the  Marne, — at 
least  I  was  bathing,  and  she  was  just  going  to, — when 
a  farmer  appeared  on  the  scene  and  yelled  at  her.  She 
was  startled  and  turning  to  make  a  run  for  it  when  I 
shouted,  'Hold  that  pose,  CelletteP  She  's  a  mighty 


162     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

well-trained  model.  For  a  second  she  held  the  pose. 
That  was  enough.  She  remembered  it  ever  after. 

"Does  it  take  a  lot  of  training  to  be  a  model  ?"  asked 
Blanche.  "How  would  I  do?"  She  turned  her  bare 
shoulders  frankly  to  him. 

Lewis  glanced  at  her.  "Yours  is  not  a  beauty  that 
can  be  held  in  stone,"  he  said.  "You  are  too  respect- 
able for  a  bacchante,  too  vivacious  for  anything  else." 
He  turned  to  Vi.  "You  would  do  better,"  he  said  as 
though  she  too  had  asked. 

Vi  said  nothing,  but  her  large,  dark  eyes  suddenly 
looked  away  and  beyond  the  room.  A  flush  rose  slowly 
into  her  smooth,  dusky  cheek.  Blanche  bit  her  under 
lip. 

"Vi  has  won  out,"  said  Helene  to  Leighton. 


CHAPTEK   XXVI 

NATALIE  and  her  mother  were  sitting  on  the  west 
veranda  of  Consolation  Cottage  at  the  evening 
hour.  Just  within  the  open  door  of  the  dining-room 
mammy  swayed  to  and  fro  in  a  vast  rocking-chair  that 
looked  too  big  for  her. 

The  years  had  not  dealt  kindly  with  the  three. 
Years  in  the  tropics  never  do  deal  kindly  with  women. 
Mammy  had  grown  old  and  thin.  Her  clothes,  frayed, 
but  clean,  hung  loosely  upon  her.  Her  hair  was  turn- 
ing gray.  She  wore  steel-rimmed  glasses.  Mrs.  Leigh- 
ton's  face,  while  it  had  not  returned  to  the  apathy  of 
the  years  of  sorrow  at  Nadir,  was  still  deeply  lined 
and  of  the  color  and  texture  of  old  parchment.  The 
blue  of  her  eyes  had  paled  and  paled  until  light  seemed 
to  have  almost  gone  from  them.  To  Natalie  had  come 
age  with  youth.  She  gave  the  impression  of  a  freshly 
cut  flower  suddenly  wilted  by  the  sun. 

In  Mrs.  Leighton's  lap  lay  two  letters.  One  had 
brought  the  news  that  Natalie  had  inherited  from  a 
Northern  Leighton  aunt  an  old  property  on  a  New 
England  hillside.  The  other  contained  the  third  offer 

163 


from  a  development  company  that  had  long  coveted 
the  grounds  about  Consolation  Cottage. 

"It  's  a  great  deal  of  money,  dear/'  said  Mrs.  Leigh- 
ton  to  Natalie.  "What  shall  we  do  ?" 

For  a  moment  Natalie  did  not  reply,  and  when  she 
spoke,  it  was  not  in  answer.  She  said: 

"Mother,  where  is  Lew?  I  want  him."  Her  low 
voice  quivered  with  desire. 

Mrs.  Leighton  put  her  fingers  into  Natalie's  soft 
hair  and  drew  the  girl's  head  against  her  breast.  A 
lump  rose  in  her  throat.  She  longed  to  murmur  com- 
fort, but  she  had  long  since  lost  the  habit  of  words. 
What  was  life  worth  if  she  could  not  buy  with  it  hap- 
piness for  this  her  only  remaining  love? 

"Darling,"  she  whispered  at  last,  "whatever  you  wish, 
whatever  you  say,  we  '11  do.  Do  you  think — would  you 
like  to  go  back  to — to  Nadir — and  look  for  Lewis  ?" 

Natalie  divined  the  sacrifice  in  those  halting  words. 
Her  thin  arms  went  up  around  Ann  Leighton's  neck. 
She  pressed  her  face  hard  against  her  mother's  shoul- 
der. She  wanted  to  cry,  but  could  not.  Without  raising 
her  face,  she  shook  her  head  and  said: 

"No,  no.  I  do  n't  want  ever  to  go  back  to  Nadir. 
Lew  is  not  there.  That  night — that  night  after  we 
buried  father  I  went  out  on  the  hills  and  called  for 
Lew.  He  did  not  answer.  Suddenly  I  just  knew  he 
was  n't  there.  I  knew  that  he  was  far,  far  away." 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     165 

Ann  Leighton  did  not  try  to  reason  against  instinct. 
She  softly  rocked  Natalie  to  and  fro,  her  pale  eyes  fixed 
on  the  setting  sun.  Gradually  the  sunset  awoke  in  her 
mind  a  stabbing  memory.  Here  on  this  bench  she  had 
sat,  Natalie,  a  baby,  in  her  lap,  and  in  the  shelter  of 
her  arms  little  Lewis  and — and  Shenton,  her  boy.  By 
yonder  rail  she  had  stood  with  her  unconscious  boy  in 
her  arms,  and  day  had  suddenly  ceased  as  though  be- 
yond the  edge  of  the  world  somebody  had  put  out  the 
light  forever.  Her  pale  eyes  grew  luminous.  The  unac- 
customed tears  welled  up  in  them  and  trickled  down 
the  cheeks  that  had  known  so  long  a  drought.  They 
rained  on  Natalie's  head. 

"Mother!"  cried  Natalie,  looking  up — "Mother!" 
Then  she  buried  her  face  again  in  Ann's  bosom,  and 
together  they  sobbed  out  all  the  oppressing  pain  and 
grief  of  life's  heavy  moment.  Not  by  strength  alone, 
but  also  by  frailty,  do  mothers  hold  the  hearts  of  their 
children.  Natalie,  hearing  and  feeling  her  mother  sob, 
passed  beyond  the  bourn  of  generations  and  knew  Ann 
and  herself  as  one  in  an  indivisible,  quivering  humanity. 

Mammy's  chair  stopped  rocking.  She  listened ;  then 
she  got  up  and  came  out  on  the  veranda.  Her  eyes  fell 
upon  mother  and  daughter  huddled  together  in  the  dusk. 
She  hovered  over  them.  Her  loose  clothes  made  her 
seem  ample,  almost  stolid. 


166    THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Wha'  f o'  you  chilun's  crying  ?"  she  demanded. 

"We  're  not  crying,"  sobbed  Natalie. 

"Huh !"  snorted  mammy.  "Yo'  jes  come  along  outen 
this  night  air,  bof  of  yo',  an'  have  yo'  suppah.  Come 
on  along,  Miss  Ann.  Come  on  along,  yo'  young  Miss 
Natalie." 

"Just  a  minute,  mammy;  in  just  a  minute,"  gasped 
Natalie.  "You  go  put  supper  on  the  table."  Then  she 
rose  to  her  feet,  and  drew  her  mother  up  to  her.  "Kiss 
me,"  she  said  and  smiled.  She  was  suddenly  strong 
again  with  the  strength  of  youth. 

Ann  kissed  her  and  she,  too,  almost  smiled. 

"Well,  dear?"  she  said. 

"We  're  going  away,"  said  Natalie,  holding  pro- 
tecting arms  around  her  mother.  "We  're  going  to  sell 
this  place,  and  then  we-  're  just  going  away  into  an- 
other world.  This  one  's  too  rough  for  just  women. 
We  '11  go  see  that  old  house  Aunt  Jed  left  to  me.  I 
want  to  live  just  once  in  a  house  that  has  had  more 
than  one  life." 

Day  after  day  the  ship  moved  steadily  northward  on 
an  even  keel.  Upon  mammy,  Natalie,  and  Mrs.  Leigh- 
ton  a  miracle  began  to  descend.  Years  fell  from  their 
straightening  shoulders.  At  the  end  of  a  week,  Ann 
Leighton,  kneeling  alone  in  her  cabin,  began  her  nightly 
devotions  with  a  paean  that  sounded  strangely  in  her 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     167 

own  ears :  "Oh,  Thou  Who  hast  redeemed  my  life  from 
destruction,  crowned  me  with  loving-kindness  and  tender 
mercies,  Who  hast  satisfied  my  mouth  with  good  things 
so  that  my  youth  is  renewed  like  the  eagle's!" 


CHAPTEE   XXVII 

AMONG  Leighton's  many  pet  theories  was  one  that 
he  called  the  axiom  of  the  propitious  moment. 
Any  tyro  at  life  could  tell  that  a  thing  needed  saying; 
skill  came  in  knowing  how  to  wait  to  say  it.  At  Lady 
Deri's  dinner  Leighton  had  decided  to  go  away  for  sev- 
eral months.  He  had  something  to  say  to  Lewis  before 
he  went,  but  he  passed  nervous  days  waiting  to  say  it. 
Then  came  the  propitious  moment.  They  were  sitting 
alone  over  a  cheerful  small  fire  that  played  a  sort  of 
joyful  accompaniment  to  the  outdoor  struggle  of  spring 
against  the  cold. 

"In  every  society,"  said  Leighton,  breaking  a  long 
silence,  "where  women  have  been  numerically  predomi- 
nant, the  popular  conception  of  morality  has  been  low- 
ered. Your  historical  limitations  are  such  that  you  '11 
have  to  take  my  say-so  for  the  truth  of  that  generality." 

"Yes,  sir,"  said  Lewis. 

"Man's  greatest  illusion  in  regard  to  woman,"  con- 
tinued Leighton,  "is  that  she  's  fastidious.  Men  are 
fastidious  and  vulgar ;  women  are  neither  fastidious  nor 
vulgar.  There  's  a  reason.  Women  have  been  too  in- 
timately connected  through  the  ages  with  the  slops  of 

168 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     169 

life  to  be  fastidious.  That  's  driven  them  to  look  upon 
natural  things  with  natural  eyes.  They  know  that  vul- 
garity is  n't  necessary,  and  they  revolt  from  it.  These 
are  all  generalities,  of  course." 

"Yes,  sir,"  said  Lewis. 

"Women  are  very  wonderful.  They  are  an  uncon- 
scious incarnation  of  knowledge.  Knowledge  bears  the 
same  relation  to  the  wise  that  liquor  does  to  the  man 
who  decided  the  world  would  be  better  without  alcohol 
and  started  to  drink  it  all  up.  Man's  premier  tempta- 
tion is  to  drink  up  women.  Lots  of  men  start  to  do  it, 
but  that  's  as  far  as  they  get.  One  woman  can  absorb 
a  dozen  men;  a  dozen  men  can't  absorb  one  woman. 
Women — any  one  woman — is  without  end.  Am  I  bor- 
ing you  ?" 

"No,  sir,"  said  Lewis.  "You  are  giving  me  a  per- 
spective." 

"You  've  struck  the  exact  word.  Since  we  met,  I  Ve 
given  you  several  of  my  seven  lives,  but  there  's  one  life 
a  man*can't  pass  on  to  his  son — his  life  with  relation  to 
women.  He  can  only  give,  as  you  said,  a  perspective." 

Leighton  chose  a  cigar  carefully  and  lit  it. 

"Formerly  woman  had  but  one  mission,"  he  went  on. 
"She  arrived  at  it  when  she  arrived  at  womanhood. 
The  fashionable  age  for  marriage  was  fifteen.  Civiliza- 
tion has  pushed  it  along  to  twenty-five.  Those  ten  cu- 
mulative years  have  put  a  terrific  strain  on  woman. 


'170     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

On  the  whole,  she  has  stood  it  remarkably  well.  But 
as  modernity  has  reduced  our  animalism,  it  has  in- 
creased our  fundamental  immorality  and  put  a  substan- 
tial blot  on  woman's  mission  as  a  mission.  Woman 
has  had  to  learn  to  dissemble  charmingly,  but  in  the 
bottom  of  her  heart  she  has  never  believed  that  her  mis- 
sion is  intrinsically  shameful.  That  'a  why  every 
woman  feels  her  special  case  of  sinning  is  right — until 
she  gets  caught.  Do  you  follow  me?" 

"I  think  so,"  said  Lewis. 

"Well,  if  you  've  followed  me,  you  begin  to  realize 
why  a  superfluity  of  women  threatens  conventional  life. 
There  are  an  awful  lot  of  women  in  this  town,  Lew." 

Leighton  rose  to  his  feet  and  started  walking  up 
and  down,  his  hands  clasped  behind  him,  his  head 
dropped. 

"I  have  n't  been  feeding  you  on  all  these  generali- 
ties just  to  kill  time.  A  generality  would  be  worth  noth- 
ing if  it  were  n't  for  its  exceptions.  Women  are  re- 
markable for  the  number  of  their  exceptions.  You  are 
crossing  a  threshold  into  a  peculiarly  lax  section  and 
age  of  woman,  I  want  you  to  believe  and  to  remember 
that  the  world  still  breeds  noble  and  innocent  women." 

Leighton  stopped,  threw  up  his  head,  and  fixed  Lewis 
with  his  eyes. 

"Do  you  know  what  innocence  is  ?  Ask  the  average 
clergyman  to  describe  innocence  to  you,  and  when  he 


gets  through,  think  a  bit,  take  off  the  tinsel  words  with 
which  he  has  decked  out  his  graven  image,  and  you  '11 
find  what?  Ignorance  enshrined.  Every  clergy  the 
world  has  seen  has  enshrined  ignorance,  and  ignorance 
has  no  single  virtue  that  a  sound  turnip  does  not  share." 

Leighton  stopped  and  faced  his  son. 

"Now,  my  boy,"  he  said,  "here  comes  the  end  of 
the  sermon.  Beware  of  the  second-best  in  women.  Many 
a  man  trades  his  soul  not  for  the  whole  world,  but  for 
a  bed-fellow."  He  paused.  "I  believe,"  he  continued, 
flushing,  "I  still  believe  that  for  every  man  there  is  an 
all-embracing  woman  to  whom  he  is  all-embracing. 
Thank  God !  I  'm  childish  enough  to  believe  in  her  still, 
though  I  speak  through  soiled  lips — the  all-embracing 
woman  who  alone  can  hold  you  and  that  you  alone  can 
hold." 

Lewis  stared  absently  into  the  fire. 

"  'The  worlds  of  women  are  seven,'  "  he  repeated, 
half  to  himself :  "  'spirit,  weed,  flower,  the  blind,  the 
visioned,  libertine,  and  saint.  None  of  these  is  for  thee. 
For  each  child  of  love  there  is  a  woman  that  holds  the 
seven  worlds  within  a  single  breast.  Hold  fast  to  thy 
birthright,  even  though  thou  journey  with  thy  back  unto 
the -light.'" 

"What — where — what 's  that  ?"  stammered  Leighton, 
staring  at  his  son. 

Lewis  looked  up  and  smiled. 


172     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Only  Old  Immortality.  Do  you  remember  her? 
The  old  woman  who  told  my  fortune.  She  said  that. 
D'  you  know,  I  think  she  must  have  been  a  discarded 
Gipsy.  I  never  thought  of  it  before.  I  did  n't  know 
then  what  a  Gipsy  was." 

"Gipsy  or  saint,  take  it  from  me,  she  was,  and  prob- 
ably is,  a  wise  woman,"  said  Leighton.  "Somehow 
I  'm  still  sure  she  can  never  die.  Do  you  remember 
all  she  said  when  she  told  you  your  fortune  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis;  "I  think  I  do.  Every  once  in  a 
while  I  've  said  it  over  to  myself." 

"I  wish  you  'd  write  down  what  she  said  and — and 
leave  it  on  my  table  for  me.  You  '11  have  to  do  it  to- 
night, for  I  'm  off  to-morrow.  Old  Ivory  and  I  have 
shot  so  much  game  we  Ve  grown  squeamish  about  it, 
but  it  seems  there -'s  a  terrific  drought  and  famine  on 
in  the  game  country  of  the  East  Coast,  and  all  the  re- 
serves have  been  thrown  open.  The  idea  is  meat  for 
the  natives  and  a  thinning  out  of  game  in  the  over- 
stocked country.  We  are  going  out  this  time  not  as 
murderers,  but  as  philanthropists." 

"I  'd  like  to  go,  too,"  said  Lewis,  his  eyes  lighting." 
"Won't  you  let  me?" 

"Not  this  trip,  my  boy,"  said  Leighton.  "I  hate  to 
refuse  you  anything,  but  do  n't  think  I  'm  robbing  you. 
I  'm  not.  I  merely  do  n't  wish  you  to  eat  life  too  fast. 
Times  will  come  when  you  '11  need  to  go  away.  Just 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     173 

now  you  've  got  things  enough  to  hunt  right  here.  One 
of  them  is  art.  You  may  think  you  've  arrived,  but  you 
have  n't — not  yet." 

"I  know  I  have  n't,"  said  Lewis. 

Leighton  nodded. 

"Ever  heard  this  sort  of  thing  ?  'Art  is  giving  some- 
thing for  nothing.  Art  is  the  ensnaring  of  beauty  in 
an  invisible  mesh.  Art  is  the  ideal  of  common  things. 
Art  is  a  mirage  stolen  from  the  heavens  and  trapped 
on  a  bit  of  canvas  or  on  a  sheet  of  paper  or  in  a  lump  of 
clay.'  And  so  on  and  so  on." 

Lewis  smiled. 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,"  continued  Leighton,  "those 
things  are  merely  the  progeny  of  art.  Art  itself  is 
work,  and  its  chief  end  is  expression  with  repression. 
Remember  that — with  repression.  Many  an  artist  has 
missed  greatness  by  mistaking  license  for  originality 
and  producing  debauch.  I  do  n't  want  you  to  do  that.  I 
want  you  to  stay  here  by  yourself  for  a  while  and  work ; 
not  with  your  hands,  necessarily,  but  with  your  mind. 
Get  your  perspective  of  life  now.  Most  of  the  pathetic 
'what-might-have-beens'  in  the  lives  of  men  and  women 
are  due  to  misplaced  proportions  that  made  them  strug- 
gle greatly  for  little  things." 

Lewis  looked  up  and  nodded. 

"Dad,  you  've  got  a  knack  of  saying  things  that  are 
true  in  a  way  that  makes  them  visible.  When  you  talk, 


174     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

you  make  me  feel  as  though  some  one  had  drawn  back 
the  screen  from  the  skylight." 

Leighton  shrugged  his  shoulders.  For  a  long  moment 
he  was  silent ;  then  he  said : 

"A  life  like  mine  has  no  justification  if  it  can't  let  in 
light,  even  though  it  be  through  stained  glass." 

Lewis  caught  a  wistful  look  in  his  father's  eyes.  He 
felt  a  sudden  surge  of  love  such  as  had  come  to  him  long 
years  before  when  he  had  first  sounded  the  depths  of  his 
father's  tenderness.  "There  's  no  light  in  all  the  world 
like  cathedral  light,  Dad,"  he  said  with  a  slight  tremble 
in  his  voice,  "and  it  shines  through  stained  glass." 

"Thanks,  boy,  thanks,"  said  Leighton;  then  he 
smiled,  and  threw  up  his  head.  Lewis  had  learned  to 
know  well  that  gesture  of  dismissal  to  a  mood. 

"Just  one  more  word,"  continued  his  father.  "When 
you  do  get  down  to  working  with  your  hands,  do  n't 
forget  repression.  Classicism  bears  the  relation  to  art 
that  religion  does  to  the  world's  progress.  It  's  a  drag- 
anchor — a  sound  measure  of  safety — despised  when  seas 
are  calm,  but  treasured  against  the  hour  of  stress. 
Let  's  go  and  eat." 

Lewis  rose  and  put  his  hand  on  his  father's  arm. 

"I  '11  not  forget  this  talk,  Dad,"  he  said. 

"I  hope  you  won't,  boy,"  said  Leighton.  "It 's  harder 
for  me  to  talk  to  you  than  you  think.  I  'm  driven  and 
held  by  the  knowledge  that  there  are  only  two  ways  in 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     175 

which  a  father  can  lose  his  son.  One  is  by  talking  too 
much,  the  other  's  by  not  talking  enough.  The  old 
trouble  of  the  devil  and  the  deep,  blue  sea ;  the  frying- 
pan  and  the  fire.  Come,  we  've  been  bandying  the 
sublime;  let  's  get  down  to  the  level  of  stomachs  and 
smile.  The  greatest  thing  about  man  is  the  range  of 
his  octaves." 


CHAPTER   XXVIII 

FOR  a  week  Lewis  missed  his  father  very  much. 
Every  time  he  came  into  the  flat  its  emptiness 
struck  him,  robbed  him  of  gaiety,  and  made  him  feel 
as  though  he  walked  in  a  dead  man's  shoes.     He  was 
very  lonely. 

"Nelton,"  he  said  one  night,  "I  wish  things  could 
talk — these  old  chairs  and  the  table  and  that  big  worn- 
out  couch,  for  instance." 

"Lucky  thing  they  can't,  sir,"  mumbled  Nelton,  hold- 
ing the  seam  of  the  table-cloth  in  his  teeth  while  he 
folded  it. 

"Why  ?"  said  Lewis.  "Why  should  it  be  lucky  they 
can't  ?  Do  n't  you  suppose  if  they  had  the  power  of  talk, 
tjiey  'd  have  the  power  of  discretion  as  well,  just  as  we 
have?" 

"I  do  n't  know  about  that,  sir,"  said  Nelton.  "Things 
is  servants  just  like  us  serving-men  is.  The  more  wooden 
a  serving-man  is  in  the  matter  of  talk,  the  easier  it  is 
for  'im  to  get  a  plice.  If  you  ask  me,  sir,  I  would  s'y 
as  chairs  is  wooden  and  walls  stone  an'  brick  for  the 
comfort  of  their  betters,  an'  that  they  'ave  n't  any  too 
much  discretion  as  it  is,  let  alone  talking." 

176 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLA'SS     177 

"Nelton,"  said  Lewis,  "I  've  been  waiting  to  ask 
you  something.  I  wonder  if  you  could  tell  me." 

"Can't  s'y  in  the  dark,"  said  Nelton. 

"It 's  this,"  said  Lewis.  "Everybody  here — all  dad's 
friends  except  Lady  Deri — call  him  Grapes  Leighton. 
Why  ?  I  've  started  to  ask  him  two  or  three  times,  but 
somehow  something  else  seems  to  crop  up  in  his  mind, 
and  he  does  n't  give  me  a  chance  to  finish." 

Nelton's  lowered  eyes  flashed  a  shrewd  look  at 
Lewis's  face. 

"The  exercise  of  discretion  ennobles  the  profession," 
he  said,  and  stopped,  a  dazed,  pleased  look  in  his  face 
at  hearing  his  own  rhyme.  He  laid  the  table-cloth 
down,  took  from  his  pocket  the  stub  of  a  pencil,  and 
wrote  the  words  on  his  cuff.  Then  he  picked  up  the 
cloth,  laid  it  over  his  arm,  and  opened  the  door.  As 
he  went  out  he  paused  and  said  over  his  shoulder: 
"Master  Lewis,  it  would  hurt  the  governor's  feelin's 
if  you  asked  him  or  anybody  else  how  he  got  the  nime 
of  Gripes." 

Let  a  man  but  feel  lonely,  and  his  mind  immediately 
harks  along  the  back  trail  of  the  past.  In  his  lonely 
week  Lewis  frequently  found  himself  thinking  back. 
It  was  only  by  thinking  back  that  he  could  stay  in  the 
flat  at  all.  Now  for  the  first  time  he  realized  that  he 
had  been  stepping  through  life  with  seven-league  boots. 
The  future  could  not  possibly  hold  for  him  the  tremen- 


178     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

dons  distances  of  his  past.  How  far  he  had  come  since 
that  first  dim  day  at  Consolation  Cottage! 

To  every  grown-up  there  is  a  dim  day  that  marks  the 
beginning  of  things,  the  first  remembered  day  of  child- 
hood. Lewis  could  not  fasten  on  any  memory  older 
than  the  memory  of  a  rickety  cab,  a  tall,  gloomy  man, 
and  then  a  white-clad  group  on  the  steps  of  Consola- 
tion Cottage.  Black  mammy,  motherly  Mrs.  Leighton, 
curly-headed  Shenton,  and  little  Natalie,  with  her 
Vumpled'  skirt,  who  had  stood  on  tiptoe  to  put  her  lips 
to  his,  appeared  before  him  now  as  part  of  the  dawn 
of  life. 

As  he  looked  back,  he  saw  that  the  sun  had  risen  hot 
on  his  day  of  life.  It  had  struck  down  Shenton,  blasted 
the  Reverend  Orme,  withered  Ann  Leighton,  and  had 
turned  plump  little  Natalie's  body  into  a  thin,  wiry 
home  for  hope.  Natalie  had  always  demanded  joy  even 
of  little  things.  Did  she  still  demand  it  ?  Where  was 
Natalie?  Lewis  asked  himself  the  question  and  felt 
a  twinge  of  self-reproach.  Life  had  been  so  full  for 
him  that  he  had  not  stopped  to  think  how  empty  it 
might  be  for  Natalie,  his  friend. 

How  little  he  had  done  to  trace  her!  Only  the  one 
letter.  He  decided  to  write  again,  this  time  to  Dom 
Francisco.  If  only  he  could  talk  to  Natalie,  what  long 
hours  it  would  take  to  tell  and  to  hear  all !  A  faint  flush 
of  anticipation  was  rising  to  his  cheeks  when  a  rap  on 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     179 

the  door  startled  him.     Before  he  could  look  around 
Helton  announced,  "A  lady  to  see  you,  sir." 

Lewis  leaped  to  his  feet  and  stepped  forward.  Had 
one  of  the  miracles  he  had  been  taught  to  believe  in 
come  to  pass  ?  Had  prayer  been  answered  ?  The  lady 
raised  her  arms  and  started  to  take  off  her  veil.  Then 
she  turned  her  back  to  Lewis. 

"Do  untie  it  for  me,"  she  drawled  in  the  slow  voice 
of  Lady  Violet  Manerlin. 

Lewis  felt  his  face  fall,  and  was  glad  she  had  her 
back  to  him.  He  undid  her  veil  with  steady,  leisurely 
fingers. 

"This  is  awfully  good  of  you,"  he  said.  "How  did 
you  know  I  was  alone  ?" 

"Telephoned  Nelton,  and  told  him  not  to  say  any- 
thing." 

Vi  took  off  her  hat  and  jacket  as  well  as  her  veil, 
and  tossed  the  lot  into  a  chair.  Then  she  sat  down  in 
a  corner  of  the  big  couch  before  the  fire,  doubled  one 
foot  under  her,  tapped  the  floor  with  the  other,  and 
yawned.  Lewis  offered  her  a  cigarette,  took  one  him- 
self, and  then  shared  a  match  with  her. 

"It 's  good  of  you  to  take  it  so  calmly,"  said  Vi.  "Are 
you  one  of  the  fools  that  must  always  have  an  expla- 
nation ?  I  '11  give  you  one,  if  you  like." 

"Do  n't  bother,"  said  Lewis,  smiling.  "You  've  been 
bored — horribly  bored.  You  looked  out  of  the  window, 


180     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

and  saw  the  green  things  in  the  park,  and  remembered 
that  there  was  only  one  bit  in  your  list  of  humanity 
as  green  and  fresh  as  they,  and  you  headed  straight 
for  it." 

"Yes,"  drawled  Vi,  "like  a  cow  making  for  the  fresh- 
est tuft  of  grass  in  the  pasture.  Thanks ;  but  I  'm  al- 
most sorry  you  told  me  why  I  came.  That  's  the  dis- 
appointing thing  to  us  women.  When  we  think  we  're 
doing  something  original,  somebody  with  a  brain  comes 
along  and  reduces  it  to  first  elements,  and  we  find  we  've 
only  been  natural." 

Lewis  straddled  a  chair,  folded  his  arms  on  the  back 
of  it,  and  looked  Vi  over  with  a  professional  eye.  She 
was  posed  for  a  painter,  not  for  a  sculptor,  but  even  so 
he  found  her  worth  looking  at.  A  woman  can't  sit  on 
one  foot,  tap  the  floor  with  the  other,  and  lean  back, 
without  showing  the  lines  of  her  body. 

"Mere  length,"  said  Lewis,  "is  a  great  handicap  to 
a  woman,  but  add  proportion  to  length,  and  you  have 
the  essentials  of  beauty.  Short  and  pretty;  long  and 
beautiful.  D'  you  get  that?  A  short  woman  may  be 
beautiful  as  a  table  decoration,  but  let  her  stand  up 
or  lie  down  and,  presto!  she  's  just  pretty." 

Vi  reached  out  one  long  arm  toward  the  fire,  and 
flicked  off  the  ash  from  her  cigarette.  She  tried  to 
hide  the  tremor  that  Lewis's  words  brought  to  her  limbs 
and  the  color  that  his  frankly  admiring  eyes  brought 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS     181 

to  the  pallor  of  her  cheeks.  She  was  a  woman  that  quiv- 
ered under  admiration. 

"Have  you  never — do  n't  you  ever  kiss  women  ?"  she 
asked,  looking  at  him  with  slanted  eyes. 

Lewis  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Oh,  I  supposB  so.  That  is — well,  to  tell  you  the 
truth,  I  do  n't  remember.' 

For  a  second  Vi  stared  at  him;  then  she  laughed, 
and  he  laughed  with  her. 

"Oh!  oh!"  she  cried,  "I  believe  you  're  telling  the 
truth!" 

They  sat  and  talked.  Nelton  brought  in  tea;  then 
they  sat  and  talked  some  more.  A  distant  bell  boomed 
seven  o'clock.  Vi  started,  rose  slowly  to  her  feet,  and 
stretched. 

"Have  you  got  your  invitation  for  the  Ruttle-Marter 
fancy-dress  ball  next  week  ?"  she  asked,  stifling  a  yawn. 

"No,"  said  Lewis;  "do  n't  know  'em." 

"That  does  n't  matter,"  said  Vi.  "I  '11  see  that  you 
get  a  card  to-morrow.  I  'd  like  you  to  come.  Nobody 
is  supposed  to  know  it,  but  I  'm  going  to  dance.  Will 
you  come?" 

"Oh,  yes,"  said  Lewis,  rising ;  "I  '11  come.  I  've  been 
a  bit  lonely  since  dad  went  away."  Then  he  smiled. 
"So  I  was  wrong,  after  all." 

"Wrong?"  said  Vi,  staring  at  him,  "When,  how?" 


182     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"This  is  what  you  really  came  for — to  ask  me  to 
see  you  dance,"  he  said,  laughing. 

"Oh,  was  it  ?"  said  Vi.  "I  'm  always  wondering 
why  I  do  things.  Well,  I  suppose  I  'd  better  go,  but 
I  hate  to.  I  've  been  so  comfy  here.  If  you  'd  only 
press  me,  I  might  stay  for  dinner." 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"Better  not." 

"Why?" 

"Well,  you  're  married,  are  n't  you  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Vi,  grimly,  her  eyes  narrowing. 

"Well,"  said  Lewis,  "you  've  heard  dad  talk.  He 
says  marriage  is  just  an  insurance  policy  to  the  mind 
of  woman." 

"Yes,"  said  Vi,  "and  that  the  best  place  to  keep 
it  is  away  from  the  fire.  Your  dad's  insight  is  simply 
weird.  But  if  you  think  you  're  going  to  start  on  life 
where  he  left  off,  let  me  tell  you  you  '11  be  chewing  a 
worn-out  cud." 

Lewis  laughed. 

"You  would  be  right  if  I  were  to  live  life  over  on  his 
lines.  But  I  won't.  He  does  n't  want  me  to.  He  never 
said  so,  but  I  just  know." 

Vi  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"You  have  a  lot  of  sense,"  she  said.  "There  's  noth- 
ing women  dislike  more.  Good-by."  She  held  out  her 
hand  and  stepped  toward  him.  She  seemed  to  misjudge 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     183 

the  distance  and  half  lose  her  balance.  The  full  length 
of  her  quivering  body  came  up  against  Lewis.  He  felt 
her  hot,  sweet  breath  almost  on  his  mouth.  He  flushed. 
His  arms  started  up  from  his  sides  and  then  dropped 
again. 

"Touch  and  go !"  he  gasped. 

"Which  ?"  drawled  Vi,  her  mouth  almost  on  his,  her 
wide,  gray  eyes  so  near  that  he  closed  his  to  save  him- 
self from  blindness. 

"Better  make  it  'go/  "  said  Lewis,  and  grinned. 

"You  've  saved  yourself,"  said  Vi,  with  a  laugh.  "If 
you  had  n't  grinned,  I  'd  have  kissed  you." 


CHAPTER   XXIX 

LEWIS  went  to  the  Ruttle-Marter  ball  determined 
to  be  gay.  He  searched  for  Vi,  but  did  not  find 
her.  By  twelve  o'clock  he  had  to  admit  that  he  was 
more  than  bored,  and  said  so  to  a  neighbor. 

"That  's  impossible,"  said  the  neighbor,  yawning. 
"Boredom  is  an  ultimate.  There  's  nothing  beyond  it ; 
consequently,  you  can't  be  more  than  bored." 

"You  're  wrong,"  said  Lady  Deri  from  behind  them. 
"For  a  man  there  's  always  something  beyond  boredom : 
there  's  going  home." 

"Touche"  cried  Lewis  and  then  suddenly  straight- 
ened. While  they  had  been  chatting,  the  curtain  of  the 
improvised  stage  at  one  end  of  the  ball-room  had  gone 
up.  In  the  center  of  the  stage  stood  a  figure  that  Lewis 
would  have  recognized  at  once  even  if  he  had  not  been 
a  participant  in  the  secret. 

The  figure  was  that  of  a  tall  woman.  Her  dark  hair 
— and  there  was  plenty  of  it — was  done  in  the  Greek 
style.  So  were  her  clothes,  if  such  filmy  draperies  could 
be  justly  termed  clothes.  They  were  caught  up  under 
her  breasts,  and  hung  in  airy  loops  to  a  little  below  her 
knees.  They  were  worn  so  skilfully  that  art  did  not 

184 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     185 

appear.  They  fluttered  about  her  softly  moving  limbs, 
but  never  flew.  The  woman  was  apparently  blindfolded 
— with  chiffon.  The  foamy  bandage  proved  an  efficient 
mask.  Chiffon  and  draperies  were  of  that  color  known 
to  connoisseurs  as  cuisse  de  nymphe. 

A  buzz  of  interested  questioning  swept  over  the  com- 
pany. Mrs.  Ruttle-Marter,  who  had  been  quite  aban- 
doned for  over  an  hour,  suddenly  found  herself  the  cen- 
ter of  a  curious  and  eager  group. 

"Who  is  she  ?"  "What  is  she  ?"  "Where  did  you  get 
her?" 

The  trembling  hostess,  flushed  by  the  first  successful 
moment  in  many  dreary  seasons,  was  almost  too  gulpy 
to  speak.  But  words  came  at  last. 

"Really,  my  dear  Duchess,  I  do  n't  know  who  she 
is.  I  do  n't  know  where  she  comes  from  or  what  she 
is.  I  only  know  her  price  and  the  name  of  her  dance. 
If  I  told  the  price,  well,  there  would  n't  be  any  rush  in 
this  crowd  to  engage  her."  So  early  did  power  lead 
the  long-suffering  Mrs.  Ruttle-Marter  to  lap  at  revenge ! 

"Well,  tell  us  the  name  of  her  dance,  anyway,"  said 
a  tall,  soldierly  gray-head  that  was  feeling  something 
for  the  first  time  in  twenty  years.  "Do  hurry !  She's 
going  to  begin." 

"I  can  do  that,"  said  Mrs.  Ruttle-Marter.  "Her 
dance  is  called  'Love  is  blind.'  " 


186    THROUGH   STAINED   GLASS 

"Love  is  blind,"  repeated  Lewis  to  Lady  Deri.  "Let  'd 
see  what  she  makes  of  it." 

People  did  not  note  just  when  the  music  began.  They 
suddenly  realized  it.  It  was  so  with  Yi's  dance.  So 
gradually  did  her  body  sway  into  motion  that  somebody 
who  had  been  staring  at  her  from  the  moment  she  ap- 
peared whispered,  "Why,  she  's  dancing!"  only  when 
the  first  movement  was  nearing  its  close. 

The  music  was  doubly  masked.  It  was  masked  be- 
hind the  wings  and  behind  the  dance.  It  did  not  seem 
interwoven  with  movement,  but  appeared  more  as  a 
soft  background  of  sound  to  motion.  So  it  remained 
through  all  the  first  part  of  the  dance  which  followed 
unerringly  all  the  traditions  of  Greek  classicism,  de- 
pending for  expression  entirely  on  swaying  arms  and 
body. 

"Who  would  have  thought  it!"  whispered  Lewis. 
"To  do  something  well  at  a  range  of  two  thousand  years ! 
That 's  more  than  art ;  it 's  genius." 

"It  's  not  genius,"  whispered  back  Lady  Deri;  "it  's 
just  body.  What  's  more,  I  think  I  recognize  the 
body." 

"Well,"  said  Lewis,  "what  if  you  do?  Play  the 
game." 

"So  I  'm  right,  eh?  Oh,  I  '11  play  the  game,  and 
hate  her  less  into  the  bargain." 

So  suddenly  that  it  startled,  came  a  crashing  chord. 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS    187 

The  dancer  quivered  from  head  to  foot,  became  very 
still,  as  though  she  listened  to  a  call,  and  then  swirled 
into  the  rhythm  of  the  music.  The  watchers  caught 
their  breath  and  held  it.  The  new  movement  was  alien 
to  anything  the  marbled  halls  of  Greece  are  supposed 
to  have  seen ;  yet  it  held  a  haunting  reminder,  as  though 
classicism  had  suddenly  given  birth  to  youth. 

The  music  swelled  and  mounted.  So  did  the  dance. 
Wave  followed  on  ripple,  sea  on  wave,  and  on  the  sea 
the  foaming,  far-flung  billow.  Limb  after  limb,  the 
whole  supple  body  of  the  blind  dancer  came  into  play; 
yet  there  was  no  visible  tension.  Never  dead,  never 
hard,  but  limp, — as  limp  as  flowing,  rushing  water, — 
she  whirled  and  swayed  through  all  the  emotions  until, 
at  the  highest  pitch  of  the  mounting  music,  she  fell 
prone,  riven  by  a  single,  throbbing  sob.  Down  came 
the  curtain.  The  music  faded  away  in  a  long,  descend- 
ing sweep. 

Men  shouted  hoarsely,  unaware  of  what  they  were 
crying  out,  and  women  for  once  clapped  to  make  a 
noise,  and  split  their  gloves.  A  youth,  his  hair  dis- 
ordered and  a  hectic  flush  in  his  cheeks,  rushed  straight 
for  the  stage,  crying,  "Who  is  she?" 

Lewis  stuck  out  his  foot  and  tripped  him.  Great 
was  his  fall,  and  the  commotion  thereof  switched  the 
emotions  of  the  throng  back  to  sanity.  Conventional, 
dogged  clapping  and  shouts  of  "Bis!  Bis!"  were  relied 


188     THKOUGH    STAINED   GLASS 

on  to  bring  the  curtain  up  again,  and  relied  on  in  vain. 
Once  more  Mrs.  Ruttle-Marter  was  surrounded  and  be- 
seeched  to  use  her  best  efforts.  As  she  acceded,  a  ser- 
vant handed  Lewis  a  scribbled  note.  "Come  and  take 
me  out  of  this.  Vi,"  he  read.  He  slipped  out  behind 
the  servant. 

In  the  cab  they  were  silent  for  a  long  time.  Lewis's 
eyes  kept  wandering  over  Vi,  conventional  once  more, 
and  lazing  in  her  corner. 

"Well,"  she  drawled  at  last,  "what  did  you  think 
of  it?" 

"Think  of  it  ?"  said  Lewis.  "There  were  three  times 
when  I  wanted  to  shout,  'Hold  that  pose !'  After  that — 
well,  after  that  my  brain  stopped  working." 

"Do  you  mean  it?"  asked  Vi. 

"Mean  what  ?" 

"About  wanting  me  to  hold  a  pose." 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis ;  "of  course.    What  of  it  ?" 

"What  of  it?    Why,  I  will.    When?" 

"Do  you  mean  it  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

Vi  nodded. 

"Name  your  own  time." 

"To-morrow,"  said  Vi,  "at  ten." 

The  following  morning  Lewis  was  up  early,  putting 
his  great,  bare  studio  in  fitting  order,  and  trying  to 
amplify  and  secure  the  screened-in  corner  which  pre- 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     189 

vious  models  had  frequently  damned  as  a  purely  tenta- 
tive dressing-room.  Promptly  at  ten  Vi  appeared. 

"Where  's  your  maid  ?"  asked  Lewis.  "You  've  sim- 
ply got  to  have  a  maid  along  for  this  sort  of  thing." 

"You  're  wrong,"  said  Vi.  "It  's  just  the  sort  of 
thing  one  does  n't  have  a  maid  for.  It  's  easier  to 
trust  two  to  keep  quiet  than  to  keep  a  maid  from  vain 
imaginings.  And — it  's  a  lot  less  expensive." 

"Well,"  said  Lewis,  "where  's  your  costume?" 

"Here,"  said  Vi,  "in  my  recticule." 

They  laughed.  Ten  minutes  later  Vi  appeared  in  her 
filmy  costume.  Lewis's  face  no  longer  smiled.  He  was 
sitting  on  a  bench  at  the  farther  end  of  the  room,  sol- 
emnly smoking  a  pipe.  He  did  not  seem  to  notice  that 
Vi's  whole  body  was  suffused,  nervous. 

"Dance,"  said  Lewis. 

Vi  hesitated  a  moment  and  then  danced,  at  first 
a  little  stiffly.  But  her  mind  gradually  concentrated 
on  her  movements;  she  began  to  catch  the  impersonal 
working  atmosphere  of  a  model. 

"Hold  that!"  cried  Lewis,  and,  a  second  later:  "No, 
that  will  never  do.  You  've  stiffened.  Try  again." 

Over  and  over  Vi  tried  to  catch  the  pose  and  keep 
it  until,  without  a  word,  she  crossed  the  room,  threw 
herself  on  a  couch,  and  began  to  cry  from  pure  exhaus- 
tion. When  she  had  partly  recovered,  she  suddenly 
awoke  to  the  fact  that  Lewis  had  not  come  to  comfort 


190     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

her.  She  looked  up.  Lewis  was  still  sitting  on  the 
bench.  He  was  filling  a  fresh  pipe. 

"Blown  over?"  he  asked  casually.  "Come  on.  At 
it  again." 

At  the  end  of  another  half -hour  Vi  gave  up  the  strug- 
gle. She  had  caught  the  pose  twice,  but  she  had  been 
unable  to  hold  it. 

"I  give  it  up,"  she  wailed.  "I  '11  simply  never  be 
able  to  stay  that  way." 

"If  you  were  a  professional  dancer,"  said  Lewis,  "I 
'd  say  'nonsense'  to  that.  But  you  're  not.  I  'm  afraid 
it  would  take  you  weeks,  perhaps  months,  to  get  the 
stamina.  Take  it  easy  now  while  I  make  some  tea." 

"Tea  in  the  morning!"  said  Vi.  "I  can't  stand  it. 
I  'd  rather  have  a  glass  of  port  or  something  like  that." 

"I  Ve  no  doubt  you  would,  but  you  're  not  going 
to  get  it,"  said  Lewis,  calmly,  as  he  went  about  the 
business  of  brewing  tea. 

Vi  finished  her  first  cup,  and  asked  for  a  second. 

"It  's  quite  a  bracer,  after  all,"  she  said.  "I  feel  a 
lot  better."  She  rose  and  went  to  the  model's  throne 
at  one  side  of  the  room.  "Is  this  where  they  stand  ?" 
she  asked. 

Lewis  nodded. 

Vi  climbed  the  throne,  and  took  a  pose.  Her  face 
was  turned  from  Lewis,  her  right  arm  half  outstretched, 
her  left  at  her  side.  She  was  in  the  act  of  stepping. 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     191 

Her  long  left  thigh  was  salient,  yet  withdrawing.     It 

was  the  pose  of  one  who  leads  the  way. 

"This  is  the  pose  you  will  do  me  in,"  she  said. 
For  a  moment  Lewis  was  silent,  then  he  said  gravely : 
"No,  you  do  n't  really  want  me  to  do  you  that  way." 
"I   do,    and   you   will,"    said   Vi,   without   looking 

around. 

For  another  long  moment  Lewis  was  silent. 

"All  right,"  he  said  at  last.     "Come  down.     Dress 

yourself.     You  've  had  enough  for  to-day." 


CHAPTEE   XXX 

WEEKS  passed.  Lewis  worked  steadily  at  his 
figure  of  Vi.  From  the  time  the  wires  had 
been  set  "and  the  rough  clay  slapped  on  them,  he  had 
never  allowed  her  to  see  the  figure. 

"It  's  no  use  asking,"  he  said.  "You  're  no  master 
at  this  art.  The  workman  who  shows  unfinished  stuff 
to  anybody  but  a  master  is  a  fool." 

"Well,  when,  then  ?"  asked  Vi,  impatiently,  after 
weeks  had  lengthened  to  months. 

"Almost  any  day  now,"  said  Lewis ;  but  before  'any 
day'  came  around,  something  happened  that  materially 
delayed  the  satisfaction  of  Vi's  curiosity. 

Lady  Deri  had  frequently  drafted  Lewis  into  dinners 
that  she  thought  would  be  stupid  for  her  without  him. 
As  a  result,  the  inevitable  in  London  happened.  It 
became  a  habit  to  invite  Lewis  when  Lady  Deri  was 
coming.  He  never  took  her  in, — her  rank  and  posi- 
tion made  that  impossible, — but  he  was  there,  some- 
where at  the  lower  end  of  the  table,  where  she  could 
watch  him  when  she  felt  bored  and  occasionally  read 
in  the  astonished  faces  of  his  neighbors  the  devasta- 
tion he  had  caused  by  some  remark ;  for  Lewis,  like  his 

192 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     193 

father,  had  a  way  of  saying  things.  The  difference  was 
that  Leighton's  mots  were  natural  and  malicious,  while 
Lewis's  were  only  natural.  On  the  whole,  Lewis  cre- 
ated the  greater  sensation. 

The  night  after  Lewis  had  said  "Almost  any  day 
now"  to  Vi,  he  found  himself  at  a  semi-diplomatic  din- 
ner next  to  a  young  person  who,  like  himself,  seemed  to 
find  the  affair  a  bit  heavy.  ^  . 

"What  did  they  invite  you  for  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

"They  could  n't  help  it,"  replied  the  young  person, 
stifling  a  yawn.  "I  'm  the  wife  of  the  charge  of  the 
Brazilian  legation.  And  you?" 

"Oh,  I  'm  here  just  to  take  Lady  Deri  home." 

The  young  person's  eyes  showed  a  gleam  of  interest 
as  they  glanced  up  the  table  to  where  Lady  Deri  sat 
and  reigned  an  easy  queen  in  that  assembly. 

"Oh,"  she  said,  "are  you  ?    Why  you  ?" 

"Well,"  said  Lewis,  "I  suppose  it  's  because  I  'm  the 
only  man  in  town  that  always  remembers  Lady  Deri's 
beauty  and  gray  hair  at  the  same  time." 

The  young  person  smiled. 

"I  believe  I  've  heard  of  you.  Leighton  is  your 
name,  is  n't  it  ?" 

"It 's  only  five  minutes  since  I  was  introduced,"  said 
Lewis,  smiling,  "and  you  made  me  say  it  over  three 
times." 

"Ah,  yes,"   said  the  lady,    unperturbed,    "but   five 


194     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

minutes  is  a  long  time — sometimes.  Is  Leighton  a  com- 
mon name?" 

"Not  as  common  as  some,"  said  Lewis.    "Why  ?" 

"Nothing,  only  I  know  some  Leightons  in  Brazil." 

Lady  Deri  saw  Lewis  start,  and  quickly  lay  down  his 
fork.  She  watched  in  vain  through  the  rest  of  that 
dinner  for  a,  conversational  sensation  at  his  end  of  the 
table.  When  they  were  in  the  carriage  and  on  the  way 
home  she  asked: 

"Well,  what  was  it  ?" 

"What  was  what  ?"  said  Lewis,  out  of  a  reverie. 

"What  did  that  Senhora  What's-her-name  have  to  tell 
you  that  made  you  forget  to  eat?" 

"She  was  telling  me  about  an  old  pal  of  mine,"  said 
Lewis.  "Did  dad  ever  tell  you  where  he  found  me?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lady  Deri ;  "he  said  he  found  you  in  the 
geometrical  center  of  nowhere,  surrounded  by  equal 
parts  of  wilderness." 

"That  's  what  he  thought,"  said  Lewis;  "but  there 
was  a  home  tucked  into  the  wilderness.  It  had  been  my 
home  for  a  great  many  years.  People  had  been  kind  to 
me  there — Mrs.  Leighton;  Natalie,  my  pal;  an  old 
darky  named  just  mammy ;  and,  in  a  way,  the  Reverend 
Orme.  After  I  'd  been  away  a  year,  I  wrote  back.  They 
had  gone.  I  've  just  found  out  where  they  are,  all  but 
the  Reverend  Orme.  I  reckon  he  must  be  dead." 

"And  you  're  going  to  write?" 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     195 

"Write  ?"  said  Lewis.  "]STo,  I  'm  not  going  to  write. 
I  'm  just  going."  For  a  moment  they  were  silent,  then 
he  said,  "There  's  something  about  hearing  of  people 
what  were  kind  to  you  that  makes  you  feel  awfully 
lonely." 

Lady  Deri  reached  out  and  took  his  hand.  Their 
hands  lay  together  on  his  knee.  The  drive  came  to  an 
end,  and  they  had  said  nothing  more.  As  they  stood 
under  the  light  of  the  outer  hall  Helene  turned  to  Lewis. 

"When  are  you  going?" 

"To-morrow." 

She  held  up  her  lips  to  him. 

"Kiss  me  good-by,  Boy." 

He  kissed  her,  and  for  a  moment  gripped  her  wrists. 

"Helene,"  he  said,  "you  've  been  awfully  good  to  me, 
too.  I — I  do  n't  forget." 

"You  do  n't  forget,"  repeated  Lady  Deri.  "That  'a 
why  I  kissed  you.  Don't  be  hard  on  your  little  pal 
when  you  find  her.  Remember,  you  've  gone  a  long  way 
alone." 

As  Lewis  strode  away  rapidly  toward  the  flat,  the 
fragrance  of  Helene  clung  to  him.  It  clung  to  him  so 
long  that  he  forgot  Vi — forgot  even  to  leave  a  note  for 
her  explaining  his  sudden  departure.  When  he  reached 
Santos,  three  weeks  later,  it  did  n't  seem  worth  while 
to  cable. 

As  Lewis  stepped  out  of  the  station  at  San  Paulo, 


196     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

he  felt  himself  in  a  dream.  He  crossed  the  street  into 
the  public  gardens  and  looked  back.  He  had  never  seen 
a  station  like  that.  It  was  beautiful.  It  had  the  spirit 
of  a  cathedral  raised  by  some  pagan  as  a  shrine  to  the 
commercial  age.  Had  the  railroad  bred  a  dreamer  ? 

Several  motor-cars  for  hire  lined  the  curb.  Lewis 
stepped  up  to  one  of  the  drivers. 

"How  did  they  come  to  build  that?"  he  asked  in 
Portuguese,  with  a  nod  toward  the  station. 

The  driver  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Too  much  money,"  he  said.  "The  charter  limits 
them  to  twenty-five  per  cent,  profits.  They  had  such 
a  surplus,  they  told  the  architect  he  could  go  as  high 
as  he  liked.  He  went  pretty  high."  The  driver  winked 
at  his  own  joke,  but  did  not  smile. 

"I  want  you  by  the  hour,"  said  Lewis.  "Do  you  know 
Mrs.  Leighton's  house — Street  of  the  Consolation?" 

The  driver  shook  his  head. 

"There  's  no  such  house,"  he  said. 

"Well,  you  know  the  Street  of  the  Consolation? 
Drive  there.  Drive  slowly." 

On  the  way  Lewis  stared,  unbelieving,  at  the  things 
he  saw.  Gone  were  the  low,  thick-walled  buildings 
that  memory  had  prepared  him  for;  gone  the  funny 
little  street-cars  drawn  by  galloping,  jack-rabbit  mules. 
In  their  stead  were  high,  imposing  fronts,  with  shallow 
doorways  and  heavy  American  electric  trams. 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     197 

The  car  shot  out  upon  a  mighty  viaduct.  Lewis 
leaned  out  and  looked  down.  Here  was  something  that 
he  could  remember — the  valley  that  split  the  city  in 
two,  and  up  and  down  the  sides  of  which  he  had  often 
toiled  as  a  boy.  Suddenly  they  were  across,  and  a 
monster  building  blotted  all  else  from  his  sight.  He 
looked  up  at  the  massive  pile.  "What  is  it  ?"  he  asked. 

"Theater  built  by  the  state,"  answered  the  driver, 
without  looking  around.  "Cost  millions." 

"Reis  ?"  asked  Lewis,  smiling. 

"Reis  ?  Bah !"  grunted  the  driver.    "Pounds." 

The  street  left  the  level  and  started  to  climb.  Lewis 
looked  anxiously  to  right  and  left.  He  saw  a  placard 
that  read,  "Street  of  the  Consolation." 

"Stop!"  he  cried. 

The  driver  drew  up  at  the  curb. 

"What  's  the  matter  ?"  he  asked. 

"This  is  n't  the  Street  of  the  Consolation,"  said 
Lewis,  dismayed.  "Where  's  the  big  cotton-tree  and 
the  priest's  house,  and — and  the  bamboos  ?  Where  are 
the  bamboos?" 

The  driver  looked  around  curiously. 

"I  remember  them,  the  bamboos,"  he  said,  nodding. 
"They  're  gone." 

"Wait  here,"  said  Lewis. 

He  stepped  out  of  the  car  and  started  to  walk  slowly 
up  the  hill.  He  felt  a  strange  sinking  of  the  heart. 


198     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

In  his  day  there  had  been  no  sidewalk,  only  a  clay 
path,  beaten  hard  by  the  feet  of  three  children  on  their 
way  to  school.  In  his  day  the  blank  row  of  houses 
had  been  a  mud  taipa  wall,  broken  just  here  by  the  little 
gate  of  the  priest's  house.  In  his  day  there  had  been 
that  long,  high-plumed  bank  of  bamboos,  forever  sway- 
ing and  creaking,  behind  the  screen  of  which  had  lain 
the  wonder  realm  of  childhood. 

He  came  to  the  spot  where  the  gate  to  Consolation 
Cottage  had  been.  The  old  wooden  gate  and  the  two 
friendly,  square  brick  pillars  on  which  it  had  swung 
were  gone ;  but  in  their  stead  rose  a  wondrous  structure 
of  scrolled  wrought  iron  between  two  splendid  granite 
shafts. 

Lewis  stood  on  tiptoe  and  gazed  through  the  gate, 
up  the  driveway,  to  where  Consolation  Cottage  had  once 
stood.  Through  the  tepid  haze  of  a  beautiful  tropical 
garden  he  saw  a  high  villa.  It  did  not  look  back  at 
him.  It  seemed  to  be  watching  steadily  from  its  hill- 
top the  spread  of  the  mighty  city  in  the  valley  below. 

Lewis  was  brought  to  himself  with  a  start.  Some- 
body behind  him  cried  out,  "O-la !"  He  turned  to  find 
two  impatient  horses  almost  on  top  of  him.  A  footman 
was  springing  from  his  place  beside  the  coachman  to 
open  the  gate. 

Lewis  stepped  aside.  In  the  smart  victoria  sat  a  lady 
alone.  She  was  dressed  in  white,  and  wore  a  great,  black 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     199 

picture-hat.  Lewis  glanced  at  her  face.  He  recognized 
the  Anglo-Saxon  pallor.  Out  of  the  dead- white  shone 
two  dark  eyes,  unnaturally  bright.  He  raised  his  hat. 

"I  beg  your  pardon/'  he  began  in  English. 

The  gate  had  swung  open.  The  horses  were  plunging 
on  the  taut  reins.  The  lady  drew  her  skirts  in  at  her 
side  and  nodded.  Lewis  stepped  into  the  carriage.  The 
horses  shot  forward  and  up  the  drive. 


CHAPTER   XXXI 

IT  was  the  only  way,"  said  the  lady  as  Lewis  handed 
her  out  of  the  carriage.    "The  horses  would  n't  wait, 
once  the  gates  were  open.    What  did  you  wish  to  say  ?" 

"I — I  wanted  to  ask  you  about  the  Leightons,"  stam- 
mered Lewis.  "They  used  to  live  here.  That  is " 

"I  know,"  said  the  lady.    "Come  up  on  the  veranda." 

That  veranda  made  Consolation  Cottage  seem  farther 
away  than  ever  to  Lewis.  Its  floor  was  tiled.  Its  roof 
was  cleverly  arranged  to  give  a  pergola  effect.  It  was 
quite  vine-covered.  The  vines  hid  the  glass  that  made 
it  rain-proof.  In  one  corner  rugs  were  placed,  wicker 
chairs,  a  swinging  book-rack,  and  a  tea-table.  The 
lady  motioned  to  Lewis  to  sit  down.  She  sat  down 
herself  and  started  drawing  off  her  long  gloves.  She 
looked  curiously  at  Lewis's  face. 

"You  're  a  Leighton  yourself,  are  n't  you  ?  Some  rel- 
ative to  Mrs.  Leighton  and  Natalie?" 

Lewis  nodded. 

"A  cousin  in  some  Scotch  degree  to  Natalie,"  he  said ; 
"I  do  n't  know  just  what."  Then  he  turned  his  eyes 
frankly  on  her. 

200 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     201 

"Where  are  they — Mrs.  Leighton  and — and  Na- 
talie?" 

"They  are  gone,"  said  the  lady.  "They  sold  out  here 
almost  a  year  ago  and  went  back  to  the  States.  I  have 
the  address  somewhere.  I  '11  get  it  for  you."  She  went, 
but  was  back  in  a  moment. 

"Thanks,"  said  Lewis.  He  did  not  look  at  her  any 
more  or  around  him.  His  eyes  fixed  vaguely  on  dis- 
tance, as  one's  eyes  do  when  the  mind  tells  them  they 
are  not  wanted. 

The  lady  sat  perfectly  still  and  silent.  The  silence 
grew  and  grew  until  by  its  own  weight  it  suddenly 
brought  Lewis  back  to  the  present  and  confusion.  He 
colored.  His  lips  were  opening  in  apology  when  the 
lady  spoke. 

"Where  have  you  been?"  she  asked. 

Lewis  gave  her  a  grateful  look. 

"I  've  been  playing  about  the  old  place,"  he  said, 
smiling.  "Not  alone.  Natalie,  Shenton,  and  I.  We 
've  been  racing  through  the  pineapple-patch,  lying  on 
our  backs  under  an  orange-tree,  visiting  the  stables,  and 
— and  Manoel's  little  house,  hiding  in  the  bramble- 
patch,  and  peeking  over  the  priest's  wall."  Lewis  waved 
his  hand  at  the  scene  that  made  his  words  so  incon- 
gruous. "Sounds  to  you  like  rank  nonsense,  I  sup- 
pose." 

The  lady  shook  her  head. 


202     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 


"No,"  she  said — "no,  it  does  n't  sound  like  non- 
sense." 

Then  he  asked  her  about  Natalie.  She  told  him 
many  little  things.  At  the  end  she  said: 

"I  feel  that  I  've  told  you  nothing.  Natalie  is  one 
of  those  persons  that  we  generally  call  a  'queer  girl' 
because  we  have  n't  the  intelligence  or  the  expression 
to  define  them.  Our  local  wit  said  that  she  was  a  girl 
whom  every  man  considered  himself  good  enough  for, 
but  that  considered  herself  too  good  for  any  man.  That 
was  unjust,  but  it  sounded  true  because  sooner  or  later 
all  the  eligibles  lined  up  before  Natalie — and  in  vain." 
The  lady  frowned.  "But  she  was  n't  selfish  or  hard. 
She  used  to  let  them  hang  on  till  they  just  dropped 
off.  She  was  one  of  those  women  that  nothing  sur- 
prises. Her  train  was  made  up  of  the  ugly  and  the 
handsome — bore,  prude,  wit,  and  libertine.  She  gave 
them  all  something;  you  could  feel  it.  I  think  she  got 
tired  of  giving  and  never  taking." 

"Is  she  so  beautiful?"  asked  Lewis. 

"Beautiful?  Oh,  no,"  said  the  lady,  and  then  sud- 
denly stopped  and  straightened.  She  laughed.  "Now 
I  look  back  on  it  all,  it  seems  she  must  be  beautiful, 
but — but  I  know  she  is  n't.  Now  /  'm  talking  non- 
sense." 

"No,  you  're  not,"  said  Lewis.  "There  are  women 
like  that."  He  reached  out  for  his  hat  and  stick. 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     203 

"You  're  not  going?"  said  the  lady.  "You  '11  stay, 
to  tea?" 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"You  've  been  very  kind,"  he  said,  "but  I  must  be 
going." 

Without  rising,  she  took  the  hand  that  he  held  out 
and  then  sat  and  watched  his  erect  figure  swing  down 
the  drive  to  the  gate.  Suddenly  she  remembered  him. 
They  had  been  together  in  school.  She  did  not  call  him 
back.  Bores  are  people  that  misjudge  the  values  of 
impressions.  The  lady  was  not  a  bore ;  she  was  a  wise 
woman. 

By  traveling  overland  to  Rio,  Lewis  caught  the  new- 
est and  finest  of  the  big  steam-packets  plying  between 
Buenos  Aires  and  Southampton.  This  old  world  of  his 
had  been  moving  apace  in  more  ways  than  one.  The 
years  since,  with  his  father,  he  had  made  this  same 
trip  were  comparatively  few,  but  during  them  progress 
had  more  than  taken  a  long  stride;  it  had  crossed  a 
line. 

He  dressed  for  dinner  at  eight.  As  he  stepped  into 
the  dining-room,  he  paused  and  stared.  It  was  like 
walking  into  some  smart  London  restaurant  after  the 
theater.  Gone  were  the  long  ship-boards  at  which  for 
generations  human  beings  had  been  lined  up  like  cattle 
at  a  trough.  In  their  place  were  scattered  small  tables, 


204    THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

round  and  square,  of  a  capacity  varying  from  two  to 
eight. 

Around  the  tables  wealth  rioted.  There  were  wealthy 
coffee-planters,  who  spent  a  yearly  fortune  on  their  an- 
nual trip  to  Paris,  surrounded  by  their  wives  and  such 
of  their  offspring  as  were  old  enough  to  escape  the  nur- 
sery table ;  planters,  sheep-  and  cattle-men  from  the  Ar- 
gentine, some  of  them  married,  all  accompanied;  and 
women.  Lewis  had  never  before  seen  so  many  beautiful 
women  at  one  time.  It  was  the  boat  of  the  season.  Over 
all  hung  an  atmosphere  of  vintage  wines. 

Lewis  was  shown  to  a  seat  at  a  table  for  two.  His 
vis-a-vis  was  a  rare,  lonely  little  man.  The  black  studs 
in  his  shirt  seemed  to  explain  him.  He  was  sour  and 
morose  till  he  found  Lewis  could  speak  French,  then  he 
bubbled  over  with  information.  It  transpired  that  the 
room  was  alive  with  situations. 

"This  is  a  crowded  boat,  but  see  the  lady  over  there  ?" 

Lewis's  eyes  followed  the  speaker's  backward  nod.  He 
saw  a  remarkably  beautiful  blonde  in  evening  dress  sit- 
ting alone  at  a  table  for  four.  She  kept  her  eyes  stead- 
ily on  her  plate. 

"We  call  her  the  Duchess,"  continued  the  little  man. 
"She  belongs  to  De  la  Valla,  the  sugar  king.  He  's  got 
his  daughters  with  him,  so  she  had  to  sit  at  another 
table,  and  he  paid  four  passages  for  her  so  she  'd  be  kept 
alone." 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     205 

Lewis  nodded  politely. 

"Now  slant  your  eyes  over  my  left  shoulder,"  con- 
tinued the  little  man. 

To  Lewis's  surprise,  he  saw  another  beautiful  woman, 
a  bright-eyed  brunette,  sitting  alone  at  a  table  for  four. 
He  turned,  interested,  to  his  table  companion  for  the 
explanation. 

"Ah-ha !"  said  the  little  man,  "you  begin  to  wake 
up.  That,  my  friend,  is  Mile.  Folly  Delaires.  She  's 
been  playing  in  Buenos  Aires.  When  she  saw  people 
staring  at  the  Duchess,  she  stepped  up  to  the  purser's 
office  and  laid  down  the  cash  for  a  table  for  four.  At 
first  we  thought  it  was  just  vanity  and  a  challenge,  but 
we  know  her  better  now.  She  's  just  the  devil  of  mis- 
chief and  several  other  things  in  the  flesh.  We  ought 
all  to  be  grateful  for  her." 

Lewis  looked  curiously  at  Mile.  Delaires.  He  watched 
to  see  her  get  up.  She  passed  close  to  him.  She  did 
not  have  the  height  that  his  training  had  taught  him 
was  essential  to  beauty,  but  she  had  certain  attributes 
that  made  one  suddenly  class  height  with  other  bloodless 
statistics.  From  her  crown  of  brown  hair  to  her  tiny 
slippers  she  was  alive.  Vitality  did  not  radiate  from 
her,  but  it  seemed  to  lurk,  like  a  constant,  in  her  whole 
body  and  in  her  every  supple  movement.  Lewis  did  not 
see  it,  but  she  was  of  the  type  that  forever  takes  and 
never  gives. 


206     THKOUGH   STAINED   GLASS 

As  she  passed  close  by  him  he  felt  an  utterly  new 
sensation,  as  though  he  were  standing  in  a  garden  of 
narcotics,  and  lassitude  were  stealing  through  his  limbs. 
When  she  had  gone,  a  single  memory  clung  to  him — 
the  memory  of  the  wonderful  texture  of  her  skin.  He 
had  read  in  a  child's  book  of  physiology  that  our  skin 
breathes.  The  affirmation  had  meant  nothing  to  him 
beyond  mechanics ;  now,  suddenly,  it  meant  much.  He 
had  seen,  felt,  this  woman's  skin  breathe,  and  its  breath 
had  been  like  the  fragrance  of  a  flower. 

For  the  first  time  in  his  life  Lewis  looked  on  woman 
with  blind  eyes.  During  almost  three  weeks  the  years 
that  he  had  lived  in  familiar  contact  with  women  stood 
him  in  good  stead.  He  never  spoke  to  the  bright-eyed 
rival  to  the  Duchess,  but  he  watched  her  from  afar. 
Men  swarmed  about  her.  She  stood  them  as  long  as 
they  amused  her,  and  then  would  suddenly  shake  them 
all  off.  There  were  days  when  she  would  let  no  one 
come  near  her.  There  was  no  day  when  any  man  could 
say  he  had  been  favored  above  another. 

Then  came  an  evening  when  Lewis  had  dressed  un- 
usually early  and  slipped  up  to  the  boat-deck  to  cool 
off  before  dinner.  He  sat  down  on  a  bench  and  half 
closed  his  eyes.  When  he  opened  them  again  he  saw 
a  woman — the  woman,  Folly  Delaires — standing  with 
her  back  to  him  at  the  rail.  He  had  not  heard  or  seen 
her  come.  Almost  without  volition  he  arose  and  stepped 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS    207 

to  the  rail.  He  leaned  on  it  beside  her.  She  did  not 
move  away. 

"I  want  to  kiss  you,"  said  Lewis,  and  trembled  as 
he  heard  his  own  words. 

The  woman  did  not  start.  She  turned  her  face  slowly 
toward  his. 

"And  I  want  you  to,"  she  said. 


CHAPTEE   XXXII 

WITHIN  two  weeks  of  Lewis's  departure  for 
South  America,  Leigh  ton  returned  from  his 
shooting-trip.  Despite  the  fact  that  he  had  not  written 
telling  Lewis  he  was  coming,  he  felt  a  great  chagrin  at 
finding  the  flat  deserted  except  for  the  ever-faithful  Hel- 
ton. 

"Where  's  the  hoy?"  was  Leighton's  first  question. 
Even  as  he  stepped  across  the  threshold  he  felt  that 
he  stepped  into  an  empty  house. 

"South  America,"  said  ISTelton,  relieving  his  master 
of  hat,  stick,  and  gloves. 

"South  America!"  cried  Leighton,  dismayed,  and 
then  smiled.  "Well,  he  's  getting  his  dad's  tricks  early. 
What  for  ?" 

"Do  n't  know,  sir.  Mr.  Lewis  said  as  you  'd  get  it 
from  her  ladyship." 

Lady  Deri  was  out  of  town.  Leighton  followed  her, 
stayed  two  days,  decided  her  momentary  entourage  was 
not  to  his  taste,  and  returned  to  London.  He  reached 
the  flat  in  the  afternoon,  just  in  time  to  receive  a 
caller.  The  caller  was  Vi. 

208 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     209 

"Hallo!"  said  Leighton  as  ISTelton  showed  her  in, 
"this  is  fortune.  Take  off  your  things  and  stay." 

"I  will — some  of  them,"  drawled  Vi ;  "but  not  just 
yet."  She  sat  down. 

"What  on  earth  are  you  doing  in  town  ?"  asked  Leigh- 
ton. 

"Well,"  said  Vi,  "up  to  three  weeks  ago  I  was  here 
at  the  beck  and  call  of  your  son.  Then  he  suddenly 
took  French  leave."  She  turned  and  faced  Leighton. 
"Where  has  he  gone?  It  is  n't  like  one  of  you  to  be 
rude  in  little  things." 

"I  do  n't  think  Lew  meant  to  be  rude,"  said  Leigh- 
ton.  "He  '"s  gone  to  South  America.  He  heard  about 
some  cousins  he  'd  lost  track  of,  and  he  just  bolted  the 
next  morning." 

"Cousins !"  said  Vi.  "I  did  n't  know  any  one  still 
went  in  for  family  ties  to  the  extent  of  South  America, 
short  of  a  fat  death." 

"JSTo,"  said  Leighton,  smiling;  there  's  no  money  in 
this  trip.  Why  were  you  at  his  beck  and  call  ?" 

"Model,"  said  Vi,  coolly.     "He  's  been  doing  me." 

"'Doing  you!"  said  Leighton,  looking  at  her  curiously. 

"There,  there,"  said  Vi,  "do  n't  let  your  imagination 
run  away  with  you.  Not  in  the  nude.  By  the  way,  can 
you  let  me  have  the  key  ?  I  left  something  in  the  studio, 
and  I  did  n't  like  to  go  to  Nelton." 


210     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Certainly,"  said  Leighton.  "I  '11  walk  by  there 
with  you." 

Vi  gave  a  shrug  of  protest,  but  Leighton's  back  was 
already  turned.  He  fetched  the  key,  and  together  they 
walked  over  to  Lewis's  atelier.  When  they  had  climbed 
the  stairs  and  were  at  the  door,  Vi  said  a  little  breath- 
lessly and  without  a  drawl: 

"Do  you  mind  very  much  not  coming  in?  I  won't 
be  but  a  minute." 

Leighton  glanced  at  her,  surprised.  "Not  at  all,"  he 
said,  and  handed  her  the  key.  He  took  out  a  cigarette 
and  lit  it  as  she  opened  the  door  and  closed  it  behind 
her.  He  started  pacing  up  and  down  the  bare  hall. 
Presently  he  grew  impatient,  and  glanced  at  his  watch ; 
then  he  stopped  short  in  his  tracks.  From  behind  the 
closed  door  came  unmistakably  the  sound  of  a  woman 
sobbing. 

Leighton  did  not  hesitate.  He  threw  open  the  door 
and  walked  in.  Except  for  Vi,  curled  up  in  a  little 
heap  on  the  couch,  the  atelier  was  very  still,  vast,  som- 
ber. In  its  center  shone  a  patch  of  light.  In  the  patch 
of  light,  on  a  low  working  pedestal,  stood  a  statue.  On 
the  floor  were  a  tumbled  cloth  and  a  fallen  screen. 
Leighton  stood  stock-still  and  stared. 

The  sculptured  figure  was  that  of  a  woman  veiled  in 
draperies  that  were  merely  suggested.  Her  face,  from 
where  Leighton  stood,  was  turned  away.  Her  right  arm 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     211 

was  half  outstretched,  her  left  hung  at  her  side,  but  it 
was  peculiarly  turned,  as  though  to  draw  the  watcher 
on.  Then  there  was  the  left  thigh.  Once  the  eye  fell 
on  that,  all  else  was  forgotten.  Into  this  sinking  sweep 
had  gone  all  the  artist's  terrific  force  of  expression  and 
suggestion.  No  live  man  would  have  thought  of  the 
figure  as  "Woman  Leading  the  Way,"  once  his  eyes  had 
fallen  on  that  thigh.  To  such  a  one  the  statue  named 
itself  with  a  single  flash  to  the  brain,  and  the  name  it 
spoke  was  "Invitation." 

Leighton's  first  impulse  was  one  of  unbounded  ad- 
miration— the  admiration  we  give  to  unbounded  power. 
Then  realization  and  a  frown  began  to  come  slowly 
to  his  face.  Vi,  crumpled  up  on  the  couch,  and  sob- 
bing hard,  dry  sobs, — the  sobs  that  bring  age, — helped 
him  to  realization.  Lewis,  his  boy,  had  done  a  base 
thing. 

Without  moving,  Leighton  glanced  about  the  room 
till  his  eyes  fell  on  the  mallet.  Then  he  stepped  quickly 
to  it,  picked  it  up,  and  crossed  to  the  statue.  Beneath 
his  quick  blows  the  brittle  clay  fell  from  the  skeleton 
wires  in  great,  jagged  chunks.  With  his  foot  he  crushed 
a  few  of  them  to  powder.  He  tossed  the  mallet  aside, 
and  glanced  at  Vi.  She  was  still  crying,  but  she  had 
half  risen  at  the  sound  of  his  blows,  and  was  staring  at 
him  through  wet  eyes. 

Leighton  started  walking  up  and  down,  the  frown 


212     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

still  on  his  brow.  Finally  he  came  to  a  stop  before  the 
couch. 

"Vi,"  he  said — "Vi,  listen !  You  must  tell  me  some- 
thing. It  is  n't  a  fair  question,  but  never  mind  that." 

She  lifted  a  tear-stained  face. 

"Vi,"  said  Leighton,  tensely,  "did  he  follow  ?" 

Vi  raised  herself  on  her  arms  and  stared  at  him  for 
a  moment  before  she  gasped: 

"You  fool,  do  you  suppose  I  would  have  cared  if  he 
had  followed  ?"  Then  shame  gripped  her,  and  she  threw 
herself  full-length  again,  face  down.  Her  shoulders 
shook,  but  she  made  no  sound. 

Leighton  waited  half  an  hour.  He  spent  the  time 
walking  up  and  down  and  smoking  cigarettes.  He  was 
no  longer  frowning.  At  the  end  of  the  half-hour  he 
caught  Vi  by  the  arms  and  lifted  her  to  her  feet. 

"Come  on,"  he  said. 

Vi  stared  at  him  as  one  half-awakened. 

"I  do  n't  want  to  go  anywhere,"  she  said.  "I  'm 
very  well  here." 

"Nonsense!"  said  Leighton,  "you  don't  realize  what 
you  're  doing  to  yourself.  On  my  word,  you  look  pos- 
itively puttyish." 

"Puttyish !"  cried  Vi,  a  flush  of  anger  rising  to  her 
face.  "Grapes,  you  're  brutal !  Since  when  have  you 
learned  to  trample  on  a  woman  ?" 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     213 

"That  'a  better/'  said  Leighton,  coolly.  "I  thought 
it  would  rouse  you  a  bit." 

Vi  almost  smiled  at  herself.  She  laid  her  hand  on 
Leighton 's  arm  and  turned  him  toward  the  door. 

"And  they  still  say  that  no  man  knows  women,"  she 
said.  She  paused  and  looked  back  at  the  fragments  of 
the  statue.  Her  lips  twisted.  "Even  boys,"  she  added, 
"pick  out  our  naked  souls  and  slap  them  in  our  faces." 

As  they  walked  slowly  toward  the  flat,  Vi  said : 

"I  know  why  you  had  to  ask  that  question.  I  'm  glad 
you  did.  You  were  misjudging  Lew.  But  you  can  be 
sure  of  one  thing:  no  one  but  us  three  ever  saw  that 
statue;  I  know  now  that  no  one  but  just  Lew  and  my- 
self were  ever  meant  to  see  it.  He  did  n't  want  to 
model  me  that  way.  When  I  asked  for  it,  he  hesitated, 
then  suddenly  he  gave  in."  She  paused  for  a  moment, 
then  she  added,  "I  believe  it  's  part  of  a  man's  job  to 
know  when  to  trample  on  women." 


CHAPTEE   XXXIII 

IT  was  night  at  the  flat.  There  was  just  chill  enough 
in  the  air  to  justify  a  cozy  little  fire.  Through  the 
open  windows  came  the  low  hum  of  London,  subdued  by 
walls  and  distance  to  the  pitch  of  a  friendly  accom- 
paniment to  talk.  In  two  great  leathern  chairs,  half 
facing  each  other,  Vi  and  Leighton  sat  down,  the  fire 
between  them. 

They  had  been  silent  for  a  long  time.  Vi  had  been 
twisting  her  fingers,  staring  at  them.  Her  lips  were 
half  open  and  mobile.  She  was  even  flushed.  Sud- 
denly she  locked  her  hands  and  leaned  forward. 

"Grapes,"  she  said  without  a  drawl,  "I  have  seen  my- 
self. It  is  terrible.  Nothing  is  left." 

Leighton  rose  and  stepped  into  his  den.  He  came 
back  slowly  with  two  pictures  in  his  hands. 

"Look  at  these,"  he  said.  "If  you  were  ten  years 
older,  you  'd  only  have  to  glance  at  them,  and  they  'd 
open  a  door  to  memory." 

Vi  gazed  at  the  pictures,  small  paintings  of  two  fa- 
mous Spanish  dancers.  One  was  beautiful,  languorous, 
carnal ;  the  other  was  neither  languorous  nor  carnal  de- 
spite her  wonderful  body,  and  she  was  certainly  not 

214 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    215 

beautiful.  Vi  laid  the  second  picture  down  and  held 
the  first.  Then  almost  unconsciously  she  reached  out 
her  hand  for  the  discarded  picture.  Gradually  the  face 
that  was  not  beautiful  drew  her  until  attention  grew 
into  absorption.  The  portrait  of  the  languorous  beauty 
fell  to  her  lap  and  then  slipped  to  the  floor,  face  down. 
Leighton  laughed. 

Vi  glanced  up. 

"Why  ?"  she  asked. 

"Oh,  nothing,"  said  Leighton,  "except  that  the  ef- 
fect those  pictures  had  on  you  is  an  exact  parallel  to  the 

way  the  two  originals  influenced  men.  For  that " 

Leighton  waved  a  hand  at  the  picture  on  the  floor — • 
"men  gave  all  they  possessed  in  the  way  of  worldly 
goods,  and  then  w'ondered  why  they  'd  done  it.  But 
for  her — the  one  you  're  looking  at " 

He  broke  off.  "You  never  heard  of  De  Larade  ?  De 
Larade  spent  all  of  his  short  life  looking  for  animate 
beauty,  and  worshiping  it  when  he  found  it.  But  he 
died  leaning  too  far  over  a  balcony  to  pick  a  flower  for 
the  woman  you  're  staring  at." 

"Why  ?"  asked  Vi  again.  "You  knew  her,  of  course. 
Tell  me  about  her." 

"I  'm  going  to,"  said  Leighton.  "The  first  time  I 
saw  her  on  the  stage  she  seemed  to  me  merely  an  extra- 
graceful  and  extra-sensuous  Spanish  dancer.  Nothing 
to  rave  over,  nothing  to  stimulate  a  jaded  palate.  I 


216     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

could  have  met  her ;  I  decided  I  did  n't  want  to.  Later 
on  I  did  meet  her,  not  in  her  dressing-room,  but  at  a 
house  where  she  was  the  last  person  I  expected  to  see." 

Leighton  picked  up  a  cigarette,  lighted  it,  and  sat 
down. 

"The  place  ought  to  have  protected  her,"  he  con- 
tinued, "but  when  you  've'seen  two  thirds  of  a  woman's 
body,  it  takes  a  lot  of  atmosphere  to  make  you  forget 
it.  We  were  in  a  corner  by  ourselves.  I  can't  remem- 
ber just  what  I  did.  Probably  laid  my  hand  on  her 
arm  with  intent.  Well,  Vi,  she  did  n't  thrill  the  way 
your  blood  and  mine  has  thrilled  an  occasion.  She  just 
shrank.  Then  she  frowned,  and  the  frown  made  her 
look  really  ugly.  'Do  n't  forget,'  she  whispered  to  me, 
'that  I  'm  a  married  woman.  I  never  forget  it — not  for 
one  minute.' ' 

Leighton  blew  a  cloud  of  smoke  at  the  fire.  It  twisted 
into  wreaths  and  whirled  up  the  chimney. 

"Quite  a  facer,  eh?"  he  went  on.  "But  it  did  n't 
down  me.  It  only  woke  me  up.  'Have  you  ever  had  a 
man  sit  down  with  you  beside  him  and  hold  you  so/  I 
asked  her,  'with  your  back  to  his  knees,  your  head  in 
his  hands  and  his  eyes  and  his  mouth  close  to  yours — a 
man  that  was  n?t  trying  to  get  to  a  single  goal,  but  was 
content  to  linger  with  you  in  the  land  of  dreams  ?' 

"Believe  me,  Vi,  the  soul  of  a  pure  woman  that  every 
man  thinks  he  has  a  right  to  make  love  to  is  the  shyest 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     217 

of  all  souls.  Such  a  woman  sheds  innuendo  and  actions 
with  the  proverbial  ease  of  a  duck  disposing  of  a  shower. 
But  just  words — the  right  words — will  bring  tears  to 
her  eyes.  Well,  I  'd  stumbled  on  the  right  words." 

"  'No/  she  said,  with  a  far-away  look,  'I  've  never 
had  a  man  hold  me  like  that.  Why  ?' ' 

"  'Why  ?'  I  said,  'Because  I  will — some  day.' ' 

"'You!'" 

"I  can't  give  you  all  the  derision  she  put  into  that 
'you!'  Then  her  face  and  her  eyes  went  as  hard  as 
flint.  'Money  V  she  asked,  and  I  answered,  'No ;  love.' ' 

Leighton  looked  at  his  cigarette  end  and  nipped  it 
into  the  fire. 

"She  laughed,  of  course,  and  when  she  laughed  she 
became  to  me  the  most  unattainable  and  consequently 
the  most  desirable  of  women.  I  was  at  that  age. 

"Well,  to  cut  the  story  short,  I  went  mad  over  her, 
but  it  was  n't  the  madness  that  loses  its  head.  It  was 
just  cunning — the  cunning  with  a  touch  of  fanaticism 
that  always  reaches  its  goal.  I  laid  seige  to  her  by  day 
and  by  night,  and  at  last,  one  day,  she  sent  for  me.  She 
was  alone;  I  could  see  that  she  meant  us  to  be  alone. 
She  made  me  sit  down.  She  stood  in  front  of  me.  To 
my  eyes  she  had  become  beautiful.  I  wanted  her,  really 
wanted  her. 

"What  she  said  was  this :  'I  've  sent  for  you  because, 
if  you  keep  on,  you  're  going  to  win.  No,  do  n't  get 


218     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

up.  Before  you  keep  on,  I  want  to  tell  you  something 
about  myself — about  what  I  believe  with  all  my  soul.  I 
do  n't  have  to  tell  you  that  I  'm  a  good  woman;  you 
know  it.  The  first  time  you  saw  me  dance  you  were 
rather  disgusted,  were  n't  you?  I  nodded.  *What  do 
you  think  of  my  dancing  now  ?" 

"I  remember  my  answer  to  that.  It  was :  'You  pos- 
sess people  gradually,  you  hold  them  forever.  It  'a 
more  than  personality  with  you,  it  's  power.' 

"Her  eyes  were  fastened  on  me.  They  drew  mine. 
'That  's  right,'  she  said;  'look  at  me.  I  want  you  to 
look  at  me.  You  see  I  'm  an  ugly  woman.'  I  cried  out 
in  protest,  and  I  meant  it.  Her  face  went  suddenly 
hard.  'You  fool,'  she  said,  'say  that  I  'm  pretty — say 
it  now!'  And  I  cried  out  at  her,  'Not  when  you  look 
like  that.  But  you  can  assume  beauty.  You  know  it.' 

"She  seemed  to  pause  in  her  thoughts  at  that  and 
smiled.  'Can  I- — for  you?'  she  asked  in  a  way  that 
made  her  divine.  Then  she  jerked  herself  back.  'I  'm 
an  ugly  woman.  My  body  is  wonderful.  Look !'  She 
raised  her  long  arms,  which  were  bare,  gave  a  half -turn, 
and  glanced  at  me  over  her  shoulder.  An  apparently 
simple  movement,  but  it  was  consummate  in  grace  and 
display.  'You  see?'  she  said,  with  a  flashing  smile. 
Then  she  turned  and  stood  stolidly.  'I  did  n't  have  a 
body  worth  speaking  of  once.  What  I  've  got  I  made — 
every  bit  of  it.' 

\ 


THKOUGH    STAINED   GLASS    219 

"She  sat  down  sidewise  on  a  chair,  folded  her  arms 
on  the  back  of  it,  and  looked  at  me  over  them.  'I  have 
that  power  you  were  speaking  of.  Do  you  know  just 
in  what  consists  a  woman's  power  over  a  man?  I  '11 
tell  you:  in  keeping  eternally  just  one  thing  that  he 
wants/ 

"She  paused  a  long  time  on  that,  then  she  went  on: 
'Some  women  hold  their  own  in  the  world  and  their 
men  by  beauty,  others  by  wit,  others  by  culture,  breed- 
ing, and  occasionally  there  's  a  woman  clever  enough 
to  hold  her  place  and  her  man  by  wealth.  I  've  got 
none  of  these  things.  I  've  got  only  one  great  gift  of 
God  by  which  I  hold  iny  power.  When  that  's  gone,  all 
is  gone.  Wise  people  have  told  me  so.  I  know  it  is 
true.'  She  rose  slowly,  came  and  stood  close  beside  me. 
'It  's — it  's  this — that  I  'm  still  my  own.  Do  you  want 
to— to  rob  me  ?'  " 

Leighton  paused,  staring  into  the  fire. 

"That  was  the  time,"  he  said,  "I  went  off  on  my 
longest  shooting-trip.  I  never  saw  her  again."  He 
looked  up.  Vi  was  very  pale. 

"You  have  been  cruel — cruel  to  me,"  she  said. 

Leighton  sprang  to  his  feet  and  started  walking  up 
and  down. 

"I  have  not,"  he  said.  "The  trouble  with  you  women 
is  you  're  forever  wanting  to  have  your  cake  and  eat 
it,  too.  If  you  thought  I  was  going  to  comfort  you  with 


220     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

sophist  assurances  that  there  's  a  way  out  of  paying 
the  price  for  the  kind  of  life  you  Ve  led,  you  were  just 
wrong.  What  I  'm  trying  to  do  is  to  give  you  a  pre- 
scription for  an  individual  sick  soul,  not  a  well  one." 

He  stopped  and  pointed  at  the  picture  lying  on  Vi's 
lap. 

"Do  n't  you  see  where  her  philosophy  helps  you  ? 
You  Ve  got  all  the  elements  of  power  that  she  lacked 
— 'beauty,  wit,  breeding,  wealth,  and — yes — and  mind. 
She  had  that,  too,  but  she  did  n't  know  it.  With  all 
that  of  your  cargo  left,  can't  you  trade  honestly  with 
life  ?  Can't  you  make  life  worth  while,  not  only  just 
to  yourself  ?  You  '11  be  trading  in  compensations,  it  's 
true." 

Leighton  started  walking  up  and  down  again. 

"In  one  of  my  many  brilliant  moments,"  he  went  on, 
"I  defined  a  compensation  to  Lewis  as  something  that 
does  n't  quite  compensate.  There  you  have  the  root  of 
most  of  the  sadness  in  life.  But  believe  me,  my  dear 
girl,  almost  all  the  live  people  you  and  I  know  are 
trading  in  compensations,  and  this  is  what  I  want  you 
to  fasten  on.  Some  of  them  do  it  nobly." 

Leighton  stood  with  folded  arms,  frowning  at  the 
floor.  Vi  looked  up  at  him  but  could  not1  catch  his  eye. 
She  rose,  picked  up  her  wraps,  and  then  came  and  stood 
before  him.  She  laid  her  fingers  on  his  arms. 

"Grapes,"  she  said,  still  without  a  drawl,  "you  have 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     221 

helped  me — a  lot.    Good  night."     She  held  up  her  lips. 

"No,  Vi,"  said  Leighton,  gravely.  "Just  give  up 
paying  even  for  kindness  with  a  kiss." 

Vi  nodded  her  head. 

"You  're  right ;  only — that  kiss  would  n't  have  been 
as  old  as  I."  She  turned  from  him.  "I  do  n't  think 
I  '11  call  you  'Grapes'  any  more." 

"Yes,  you  will,"  said  Leighton.  "We  're  born  into 
one  name;  we  earn  another.  We  've  got  a  right  to 
the  one  we  earn.  You  see,  even  a  man  can't  have  his 
cake " 

But,  with  a  wave  of  her  hand,  Vi  was  gone.  Leigh- 
ton  heard  Nelton  running  down  the  stairs  to  call  a 
cab  for  her. 


CHAPTEE   XXXIV 

MLLE.  FOLLY  DELAIEES  was  not  born  with- 
in a  stone's  throw  of  the  Paris  fortifications, 
as  her  manager  would  have  liked  you  to  believe,  but  in 
an  indefinite  street  in  Coekneydom,  so  like  its  mates 
that,  in  the  words  of  Folly  herself,  she  had  to  have  the 
homing  instinct  of  a  pigeon  to  find  it  at  all.  Folly's 
original  name  had  been — but  why  give  it  away?  She 
was  one  of  those  women  who  are  above  and  beyond  a 
name — of  a  class,  or,  rather,  of  a  type  that  a  relatively 
merciful  world  produces  sparingly.  She  was  all  body 
and  no  soul. 

From  the  moment  that  Lewis  kissed  Folly,  and  then 
kissed  her  several  times  more,  discovering  with  each 
essay  depths  in  the  art  which  even  his  free  and  easy 
life  had  never  given  him  occasion  to  dream  of,  he  be- 
came infatuated — so  infatuated  that  the  following  dia- 
logue passed  over  him  and  did  not  wake  him. 

"Why  are  you  crying?"  asked  Lewis,  whom  tears 
had  never  before  made  curious. 

"I  'm  crying,"  gasped  Folly,  stamping  her  little  foot, 
"because  it  's  taken  so  long!" 

222 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    223 

Lewis  looked  down  at  her  brown  head,  buried  against 
his  shoulder,  and  asked  dreamily: 

"Are  you  spirit  and  flower,  libertine  and  saint?" 

To  which  Folly  replied :  "Well,  I  was  the  flower-girl 
once  in  a  great  hit,  and  I  played  'The  E"un'  last  sea- 
son, you  remember.  As  for  spirits,  I  had  the  refusal  of 
one  of  the  spirit  parts  in  the  first  "Blue  Bird"  show, 
but  there  were  too  many  of  them,  so  I  turned  it  down. 
I  'd  have  felt  as  though  I  'd  gone  back  to  the  chorus. 
Libertine/  she  mused  finally — "what  is  a  libertine?" 

Lewis's  father  could  have  looked  at  Folly  from 
across  the  street  and  given  her  a  very  complete  and 
charming  definition  for  a  libertine  in  one  word.  But 
Lewis  had  not  yet  reached  that  wisdom  which  tells  us 
that  man  learns  to  know  himself  last  of  all.  He  did 
not  realize  that  your  true-born  libertine  never  knows  it. 
Whatever  Folly's  life  may  have  been,  and  he  thought 
he  had  no  illusions  on  that  score,  he  seized  upon  her 
question  as  proving  that  she  still  held  the  potential 
bloom  of  youth  and  a  measure  of  innocence. 

To  do  her  justice,  Folly  was  young,  and  also  she  had 
asked  her  question  in  good  faith.  As  to  innocence — 
well,  what  has  never  consciously  existed,  causes  no  lack. 
Folly's  little  world  was  exceedingly  broad  in  one  way 
and  as  narrow  in  another,  but,  like  few  human  worlds, 
it  contained  a  miracle.  The  miracle  was  that  it  abso- 


224     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

lutely  satisfied  her.  She  dated  happiness,  content,  and 
birth  itself  from  the  day  she  went  wrong. 

She  had  the  appearance  of  being  frank,  open,  and 
lovable,  just  as  she  had  that  appearance  of  culture  which 
every  woman  of  her  type  gets  from  the  cultivated  class 
of  men  they  prey  upon.  Pet  her,  and  she  murmured 
softly  in  the  king's  best  English :  scratch  her,  and,  like 
the  rock  that  Moses  struck,  she  burst  forth  in  a  sur- 
prising torrent.  Without  making  others  merry,  she  was 
eternally  merry.  Without  ever  feeling  the  agony  of 
thirst,  she  instilled  thirst.  A  thousand  broken-hearted 
women  might  have  looked  on  her  as  an  avenging  sword, 
if  the  sword  had  n't  been  two-edged.  She  had  a  motto, 
a  creed,  a  philosophy,  packed  into  four  words:  "Be 
loved ;  never  love." 

If  both  parts  of  this  creed  had  not  been  equally  im- 
perative, Lewis  might  have  escaped.  His  aloofness  was 
what  doomed  him.  Like  all  big-game  hunters,  Folly 
loved  the  rare  trophy,  the  thing  that  's  hard  to  get.  By 
keeping  his  distance,  Lewis  pressed  the  spring  that 
threw  her  into  action.  Almost  instinctively  she  con- 
centrated on  him  all  her  forces  of  attraction ;  and 
Folly's  forces  of  attraction,  once  you  pressed  the  spring, 
were  simply  dynamic.  Beneath  that  soft,  breathing 
skin  of  hers  was  such  store  of  vitality,  intensity,  and 
singleness  of  purpose  as  only  the  vividly  monochro- 
matic ever  bring  to  bear  on  life. 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     225 

Lewis,  unconsciously  in  very  deep  waters  indeed, 
reached  London  in  a  state  of  ineffable  happiness.  Not 
so  Folly.  Lewis  had  awakened  in  her  desire.  With 
her,  desire  was  merely  the  prelude  to  a  natural  con- 
summation. Folly  was  worried  because  one  of  the  first 
and  last  things  Lewis  had  said  to  her  was,  "Darling, 
when  will  you  marry  me  ?"  To  which  she  had  replied, 
but  without  avail,  "Let  's  think  about  that  afterward." 

When  Lewis  reached  the  flat  on  a  Saturday  night,  he 
did  not  have  to  tell  his  father  that  something  wonderful 
had  happened.  Leighton  saw  it  in  his  face — a  face 
suddenly  become  more  boyish  than  it  had  ever  been 
before.  They  rushed  feverishly  through  dinner,  for 
Lewis's  mood  was  contagious.  Then  they  went  into  the 
living-room,  and  straight  for  the  two  big  leather  chairs 
which,  had  they  lacked  that  necessary  measure  of  dis- 
cretion which  JSTelton  had  assigned  to  them,  might  have 
told  of  many  a  battle  of  the  mind  with  the  things  that 
are. 

Well,  Boy,"  said  Leighton,  "what  is  it  ?" 

"Dad,"  cried  Lewis,  with  beaming  face,  "I  've  found 
the  woman — the  all-embracing  woman." 

Leighton's  mind  wandered  back  to  the  tales  of  Lewis's 
little  pal  Natalie. 

"Tell  me  about  her — again,"  he  said  genially. 

"Again !"  cried  Lewis.  "But  you  've  never  heard  of 
her — not  from  me,  anyway." 


226     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"What  's  her  name?"  asked  Leighton,  half  aroused. 

"Her  name,"  said  Lewis,  smiling  absently  into  the 
fire,  "is  Folly— Folly  Delaires." 

Leighton  was  a  trained  stalker  of  dangerous  game. 
Surprise  never  startled  him  into  movement.  It  stilled 
him.  Old  Ivory  had  once  said  of  him  that  he  could 
make  his  heart  stop  beating  at  the  smell  of  elephant; 
which  is  quite  a  different  thing  from  having  your  heart 
stop  beating  on  its  own  hook.  When  Lewis  said,  "Folly 
— Folly  Delaires,"  Leighton  suddenly  became  intensely 
still.  He  remained  still  for  so  long  that  Lewis  looked 
up.- 

"Well,  Dad,  what  is  it?"  he  asked,  still  smiling. 
"Have  you  heard  of  her  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton,  quietly,  "I  've  heard  of  her. 
I  've  even  seen  her.  She  's  a  beautiful — she  has  a 
beautiful  body.  Tell  me  just  how  it  happened." 

Then  Lewis  talked,  and  Leighton  appeared  to  listen. 
He  knew  all  the  stages  of  that  via  dolorosa  too  well  to 
have  to  pay  close  attention  to  Lewis's  description  of 
the  first  emotional  step  of  man  toward  man's  surest 
tribulation. 

There  was  no  outburst  from  Leighton  when  Lewis 
finished.  On  the  contrary,  he  made  an  effort  to  hide 
his  thoughts,  and  succeeded  so  well  that,  had  it  not 
been  for  a  touch  of  bitterness  in  his  smile,  Lewis  might 
have  been  led  to  think  that  with  this  active  calm  his 


THEOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     227 

father  would  have  received  the  announcement  of  his 
son's  choice  of  any  woman. 

"Dad,"  said  Lewis,  troubled,  "why  do  you  smile  like 
that?" 

"I  am  smiling,"  said  Leighton,  "at  the  tragedy  of 
philanthropy.  Any  man  can  get;  it  takes  a  genius  to 
give.  There  are  things  I  've  got  that  I  'd  like  to  give 
you  now — on  the  eve  of  your  greatest  trouble."  Lewis 
threw  up  his  head  in  amazement.  He  would  have  pro- 
tested but,  with  a  half-raised  hand,  Leighton  stilled 
him.  "No,"  he  went  on,  "I  do  n't  expect  you  to  acquire 
prescience  all  in  a  moment,  nor  do  I  expect  myself  to 
acquire  the  genius  of  giving  to  a  sudden  need  in  half 
an  hour.  Let  's  let  things  stand  this  way.  You  love 
Folly  Delaires ;  I  do  n't.  I  do  n't  want  to  be  converted, 
and  you  do  n't.  But  one  of  us  has  simply  got  to  be, 
because — well — because  I  like  to  think  we  've  lived  too 
long  together  in  spirit  to  take  to  two  sides  of  a  fence 
now." 

Lewis  felt  a  sudden  depression  fall  on  him,  all  the 
more  terible  for  the  exaltation  that  had  preceded  it. 

"Two  sides  of  a  fence,  Dad?"  he  said.  "That  can 
never  be.  I — I  've  just  got  to  convert  you.  When  you 
know  her,  she  '11  help  me." 

The  two  rose  to  their  feet  on  a  common  impulse. 
Leighton  laid  his  hand  on  Lewis's  shoulder. 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "forgive  me  for  making  your  very 


228     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

words  my  own.  I  have  no  illusions  as  to  the  power  of 
woman.  She  is  at  once  the  supreme  source  of  happiness 
and  of  poignant  suffering.  You  think  your  woman  will 
help  you ;  1  think  she  '11  help  me.  That  neutralizes  her 
a  bit,  does  n't  it?  It  reduces  our  battle  to  the  terms 
of  single  combat — unless  one  of  us  is  right  about 
Folly." 

"But,  Dad,"  stammered  Lewis,  "I  do  n't  want  a 
battle." 

Leighton  pressed  his  hand  down.  Unconsciously 
Lewis  straightened  under  the  pressure. 

"Listen  to  this,"  said  Leighton.  "The  battles  of  life 
are  n't  served  up  like  the  courses  at  a  dinner  that  you 
can  skip  at  will.  In  life  we  have  to  fight.  Mostly  we 
have  to  fight  people  we  love  for  things  we  love  better. 
Sometimes  we  fight  them  for  the  very  love  we  bear 
them.  You  and  I  are  going  to  fight  each  other  because 
we  can't  help  it.  Let  's  fight  like  gentlemen — to  the 
finish — and  smile.  My  boy,  you  do  n't  know  Folly." 

"It  's  you  who  do  n't  know  Folly,  Dad,"  said  Lewis. 
He  tried  to  smile,  but  his  lips  twitched  treacherously. 
Not  since  Leighton  had  gambled  with  him,  and  won 
all  he  possessed,  had  such  a  blow  been  dealt  to  his  faith. 


CHAPTER    XXXV 

BOTH  Lewis  and  his  father  passed  a  miserable 
night,  but  not  even  Nelton  could  have  guessed 
it  when  the  two  met  in  the  morning  for  a  late  Sunday 
breakfast.  Leighton  felt  a  touch  of  pride  in  the  bear- 
ing of  his  son.  He  wondered  if  Lewis  had  taken  to 
heart  a  saying  of  his :  "To  feel  sullen  is  human  nature ; 
to  show  it  is  ill  breeding."  He  decided  that  he  had  n't, 
on  the  grounds  that  no  single  saying  is  ever  more  than 
a  straw  tossed  on  the  current  of  life. 

When  they  had  finished  breakfast  in  their  accustomed 
cheerful  silence,  Leighton  settled  down  to  a  long  cigar 
and  his  paper. 

"I  suppose  you  're  off  to  see  your  lady,"  he  said 
casually. 

Lewis  laughed. 

"Not  yet.    She  is  n't  up  until  twelve  ever." 

"Does  n't  get  up  until  twelve?"  said  Leighton. 
"You  've  found  that  out,  eh  ?" 

"I  did  n't  say  'does  n't  get  up' ;  I  said  'is  n't.'  She 
gets  up  early  enough,  but  it  takes  her  hours.  I  've 
never  even  heard  of  a  woman  that  takes  such  care  of 
herself." 

229 


230     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Leighton  laid  his  paper  aside. 

"By  the  way,"  he  said,  "I  've  a  confession  to  make 
to  you,  one  that  has  worried  me  for  some  days.  Your 
little  affair  drove  it  out  of  my  mind  last  night." 

"Well,  Dad,  go  ahead,"  said  Lewis.  "I  won't  be 
hard  on  you." 

"Have  you  any  recollection  of  what  you  were  work- 
ing on  before  you  went  away  ?" 

For  a  moment  Lewis's  face  looked  blank,  then  sud- 
denly it  flushed.  He  turned  sharp  eyes  on  his  father. 

"I  left  the  studio  locked,"  he  said. 

Leighton  colored  in  his  turn. 

"I  forgive  you  that,"  he  said  quietly.  "Just  after 
I  came  back  to  town  Vi  called  and  told  me  she  had  been 
posing  for  you.  She  said  she  had  left  something  in  the 
studio  that  she  wanted  .to  fetch  herself.  She  asked  me 
for  the  key." 

Lewis's  hands  were  clenched. 

"Well?"  he  asked. 

"I  went  with  her — to  the  door.  She  asked  me  to 
wait  outside.  She  was  gone  a  long  time.  I  heard  her 
sobbing " 

"Sobbing?    Vi?" 

Leighton  nodded. 

"So — so  I  went  in." 

Father  and  son  looked  steadily  at  each  other  for  a 
moment.  Then  Lewis  said: 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     231 

"You  Ve  forgiven  me  for  my  thought,  Dad;  now  I 
beg  your  pardon  for  it.  I  suppose  you  saw  that  that 
bit  of  modeling  was  never  intended  for  the  Salon  ?  It 
was  meant  for  Vi — because — well,  because  I  liked  her 
enough  to " 

"I  know,"  interrupted  Leighton.  "Well,  it  worked. 
It  worked  as  such  cures  seldom  do.  While  Vi  was  sob- 
bing her  heart  out  on  the  couch,  I  smashed  up  the  statue 
with  a  mallet.  That  'a  my  confession." 

Lewis  did  not  move. 

"Did  you  hear  what  I  said?"  asked  Leighton.  "I 
smashed  up  your  model  of  Vi." 

"I  heard  you,  Dad,"  said  Lewis.  "But  you  must  n't 
expect  me  to  get  excited  over  it,  because  it  'a  what  I 
should  have  done  myself,  once  she  had  seen  it." 

"When  I  did  it,"  continued  Leighton,  "I  had  no 
doubts ,-  but  since  then  I  'VQ  thought  a  lot.  I  want  you 
to  know  that  if  that  cast  had  gone  into  marble  or 
bronze,  it  would  have  had  the  eternal  life  of  art  itself." 

Lewis  flushed  with  pleasure.  He  knew  that  such 
praise  from  his  father  must  have  been  weighed  a  thou- 
sand times  before  it  gained  utterance.  Only  from  one 
other  man  on  earth  could  commendation  bring  such  a 
thrill.  As  the  name  of  Le  Brux  came  to  his  mind,  it 
fell  from  his  father's  lips. 

"Le  Brux  has  been  giving  me  an  awful  talking  to." 

"Le  Brux!"  cried  Lewis.     "Has  he  been  here?" 


232     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Only  in  spirit,"  said  Leighton,  smiling.  "And  this 
is  what  he  said  in  his  voice  of  thunder :  'If  I  had  been 
here,  I  would  have  stood  by  that  figure  with  a  mallet 
and  smashed  the  head  of  any  man  that  raised  a  finger 
against  it.  What  is  the  world  coming  to  when  a  mere 
life  weighs  more  in  the  balance  than  the  most  trifling 
material  expression  of  eternity  ?' 

"  'But,  Master,'  I  said,  'a  gentleman  must  always  re- 
member the  woman.' 

"To  which  he  replied,  'What  business  has  an  artist 
to  be  anything  so  small  as  a  mere  gentleman  ?  It  is 
not  alone  for  fame  and  repute  that  we  great  have  our 
being.  If  by  the  loss  of  my  single  soul  I  can  touch 
a  thousand  other  souls  to  life,  bring  sight  to  the  blind 
and  hearing  to  ears  that  would  not  hear,  what,  then,  is 
my  soul  ?  Nothing.' ' 

Leighton  stopped  and  leaned  forward. 

"Then  he  said  this,  and  the  thunder  was  gone  from 
his  voice:  'When  all  the  trappings  of  the  world's  re- 
ligions have  rotted  away,  the  vicarious  intention  and 
example  of  Christ  will  still  stand  and  bring  a  surge 
to  the  hearts  of  unforgetful  men.  Thou  child,  believe 
me,  what  humanity  has  gained  of  the  best  is  founded 
solidly  on  sacrifice — on  the  individual  ruin  of  many 
men  and  women  and  little  children.' ' 

Leighton   paused.      Lewis   was   sitting   with   locked 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     233 

hands.  He  was  trying  to  detach  his  mind  from  per- 
sonalities. 

"That's  a  great  sophistry,  is  n't  it?"  he  said. 

"Do  you  know  the  difference  between  a  sophistry  and 
a  great  sophistry  ?"  asked  Leighton.  "A  sophistry  is  a 
lie;  a  great  sophistry  is  merely  super-truth." 

"I  can  see,"  he  went  on,  "that  it  's  difficult  for  you 
to  put  yourself  outside  sculpture.  Let  's  switch  off  to 
literature,  because  literature,  next  to  music,  is  the  su- 
preme expression  in  art.  I  heard  one  of  the  keenest 
men  in  London  say  the  other  day,  'The  man  who  writes 
a  book  that  everybody  agrees  with  is  one  of  two  things : 
a  mere  grocer  of  amusement  or  a  mental  pander  to 
cash.' 

"You  've  read  Irving's  tales  of  the  Catskills  and  of 
the  Alhambra.  Vignettes.  I  think  I  remember  seeing 
you  read  Hawthorne's  "Scarlet  Letter."  I  pick  out  two 
Americans  because  to-day  our  country  supports  more 
literary  grocers  and  panders  than  the  rest  of  the  world 
put  together.  It  is  n't  the  writers'  fault  altogether. 
You  can't  turn  a  nation  from  pap  in  a  day  any  more 
than  you  can  wean  a  baby  on  lobster  a  la  Newburg. 

"But  to  get  back.  You  might  say  that  Irving  gives 
the  lie  to  my  keen  friend  unless  you  admit,  as  I  do, 
that  Irving  was  not  a  writer  of  books  so  much  as  a 
painter  of  landscapes.  He  painted  the  scenes  that  were 
dear  to  his  heart,  and  in  his  still  blue  skies  he  hung 


234    THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

the  soft  mists  of  fable,  of  legend,  and  of  the  pageant  of 
a  passing  race.  Hawthorne  was  his  antithesis — a 
painter  of  portraits  of  the  souls  of  men  and  women. 
That  's  the  highest  achievement  known  to  any  branch 
of  art."  Leighton  paused.  "Do  you  know  why  those 
two  men  wrote  as  they  did?" 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"Because,  to  put  it  in  unmistakable  English,  they 
had  something  on  their  chest,  and  they  had  to  get  it 
off.  Irving  wrote  to  get  away  from  life.  Hawthorne 
never  wrote  to  get  away  from  life, — he  wrote  himself 
into  it  forever  and  forever." 

Leighton  paused  to  get  his  cigar  well  alight. 

"And  now,"  he  went  on,  "we  come  to  the  eternal  crux. 
Which  is  beauty  ?  Irving's  placid  pictures  of  light,  or 
Hawthorne's  dark  portrayals  of  the  varying  soul  of 
man  ?"  He  turned  to  Lewis.  "What  's  your  idea  of  a 
prude?" 

"A  prude,"  stammered  Lewis — "why  a  prude  's  a 
person  with  an  exaggerated  idea  of  modesty,  is  n't  it  ?" 

"Bah!"  said  Leighton,  "you  are  as  flat  as  a  diction- 
ary. A  prude  is  a  far  more  active  evil  than  that.  A 
prude,  my  boy,  is  one  who  has  but  a  single  eye,  and 
that  in  the  back  of  his  head,  and  who  keeps  his  blind 
face  set  toward  nature.  If  he  would  be  content  to  walk 
backward,  the  world  would  get  along  more  easily,  and 
would  like  him  better  the  farther  he  walked.  The  rea- 


son  the  live  world  has  always  hated  prudes  is  that  it  's 
forever  being  stumbled  on  by  them.  Your  prude 
clutches  Irving  to  the  small  of  his  back  and  cries,  "This 
alone  is  beauty !'  But  any  man  with  two  eyes  looks 
and  answers,  'You  are  wrong;  this  is  beauty  alone.' 

"And  now  do  you  see  where  we  've  come  out?  To 
make  a  thing  of  beauty  alone  is  to  bring  a  flash  of  joy 
to  a  hard-pressed  world.  But  joy  is  never  a  force,  not 
even  an  achievement.  It  's  merely  an  acquisition.  It 
is  n't  alive.  The  man  who  writes  on  paper  or  in  stone 
one  throbbing  cry  of  the  soul  has  lifted  the  world  by 
the  power  of  his  single  arm.  He  alone  lives.  And  it 
is  written  that  you  shall  know  life  above  all  the  crea- 
tures that  are  in  sea  and  land  and  in  the  heavens  above 
the  earth  by  this  sign :  sole  among  the  things  that  are, 
life  is  its  own  source  and  its  own  end." 

Leighton  stopped. 

"You  see  now,"  he  added,  "why  half  of  me  is  sorry 
that  it  let  the  other  half  smash  up  that  cast.  What 
claim  has  a  puny  person  against  one  flicker  of  eternal 
truth?" 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  slowly,  "I  see.  I  can  follow  your 
logic  to  the  very  end.  I  can't  answer  it.  All  I  know 
is  that  I  myself — I  could  n't  have  paid  the  price,  nor 
— nor  let  Vi  pay  it." 

"And  to  tell  you  the  truth,"  said  Leighton  with  a 
smile,  "I  do  n't  know  that  I  'm  sorry." 


236     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  rose  to  his  feet. 

"Well,  Dad,"  he  said,  "it  's  about  twelve  o'clock." 

"Go  ahead,  my  boy,"  said  Leighton.    "Bring  the  lady 

to  lunch  to-day  or  any  other  day — if  she  '11  come.    Just 

telephone  Nelton." 


CHAPTER    XXXVI 

DURHSTG  the  next  few  days  Leighton  saw  little 
of  his  son  and  nothing  of  Folly,  but  he  learned 
quite  casually  that  the  lady  was  occupying  an  apart- 
ment overlooking  Hyde  Park.  From  that  it  was  easy 
for  him  to  guess  her  address,  and  one  morning,  with- 
out saying  anything  to  Lewis  of  his  plans,  he  presented 
himself  at  Folly's  door.  A  trim  maid  opened  to  his 
ring. 

"Is  Mile.  Delaires  in,  my  dear  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

The  maid  stiffened,  and  peered  intently  at  Leighton, 
who  stood  at  ease  in  the  half-dusk  of  the  hall.  When 
she  had  quite  made  out  his  trim,  well-dressed  figure, 
she  decided  not  to  be  as  haughty  as  she  had  at  first 
intended. 

"Miss  Delaires,"  she  said,  without  quite  unbending, 
however,  "is  not  in  to  callers  at  half  after  ten;  she  's 
in  her  bath." 

"I  am  fortunate,"  remarked  Leighton,  coolly.  "Will 
you  take  her  my  card?"  He  weighted  it  with  a  sov- 
ereign. 

"Oh,  sir,"  said  the  maid,  "it  's  not  fair  for  me  to 
take  it.  She  won't  be  seeing  you.  I  can  promise." 

237 


238     THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Where  shall  I  wait  ?"  asked  Leighton,  stepping  past 
her. 

"This  way,  sir." 

He  was  shown  into  a  small,  but  dainty,  sitting-room. 
The  door  beyond  was  ajar,  and  before  the  maid  closed 
it  he  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  large  bedroom  still  in  dis- 
array. In  the  better  light  the  maid  glanced  at  his  face 
and  then  at  his  card. 

"What  kin  are  you  to  Mr.  Lewis  Leighton,  please, 
sir?"  she  asked. 

"I  have  every  reason  to  believe  that  I  'm  his  father," 
said  Leighton,  smiling. 

"I  should  say  you  had,  sir,"  answered  the  maid,  with 
a  laugh,  "if  looks  is  a  guaranty.  But  even  so  she  won't 
see  you,  I  'm  afraid." 

"I  do  n't  mind  much  if  she  does  n't,"  said  Leighton. 
"Just  to  have  had  this  chat  with  you  makes  it  a  charm- 
ing morning." 

In  saying  that  Miss  Delaires  was  in  her  bath,  the 
maid  had  committed  an  anachronism.  Folly  was  not 
in  her  bath.  She  had  been  in  her  bath  over  an  hour 
ago;  now  she  was  in  her  bandages. 

Folly's  bath-room  was  not  as  large  as  her  bedroom, 
but  it  was  larger  than  anything  since  Rome.  To  the 
casual  glance,  its  tiled  floor  and  walls  and  its  numer- 
ous immaculate  fittings,  nickel-trimmed  and  glass-cov- 
ered, gave  the  impression  of  a  luxurious  private-clinic 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    239 

theater.  Standing  well  away  from  one  wall  was,  in 
fact,  a  glass  operating-table  of  the  latest  and  choicest 
design.  A  more  leisurely  inspection  of  the  room,  how- 
ever, showed  this  operating-table  to  be  the  only  item — 
if  a  large-boned  Swedish  masseuse  be  omitted — directly 
reminiscent  of  a  surgery.  All  the  other  glittering  appli- 
ances, including  an  enormous  porcelain  tub,  were  subtly 
allied  to  the  cult  of  healthy  flesh. 

At  the  moment  when  the  maid  entered  with  Leigh- 
ton's  card,  Folly  was  virtually  indistinguishable.  She 
could  only  be  guessed  at  in  the  mummy-like  form  ex- 
tended, but  not  stretched,  if  you  please,  on  the  operat- 
ing-table. Her  face,  all  but  a  central  oval,  was  held 
in  a  thin  mask  of  kidskin,  and  her  whole  body,  from 
neck  to  peeping  pink  toes,  was  wrapped  closely  in  ban- 
dages soaked  with  cold  cream.  The  bath-tub  was  still 
half-full  of  tepid  water,  from  which  rose  faint  exhala- 
tions of  the  latest  attar,  so  delicate  that  they  attained 
deception,  and  made  one  look  around  instinctively  for 
flowers. 

Folly's  big  brown  eyes  seemed  to  be  closed,  but  in 
reality  they  were  fixed  on  a  little  clock  in  plain,  white 
porcelain,  to  match  the  room,  which  stood  on  a  glass 
shelf  high  on  the  wall  in  front  of  her.  "I  'm  sure  that 
old  clock  has  stopped,"  she  cried  petulantly  to  the  mas- 
seuse. "Tell  me  if  it  's  ticking." 

"Ut  's  ticking,"  said  the  masseuse,  patiently.     Then 


240     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

she  added,  as  though  she  were  reciting:  "Be  mindful. 
Youth  is  a  fund  that  can  be  saved  up  like  pennies.  The 
tenure  of  youth  and  beauty  is  determined  by  the  amount 
and  the  quality " 

"Of  relaxation/'  chanted  Folly,  breaking  in.  "It  is 
not  enough  that  the  body  be  relaxed;  wrinkles  come 
from  the  mind.  Relax  your  mind  even  as  you  relax 
your  fingers  and  your  toes.  Tra-la-la,  la-la!"  Folly 
wriggled  the  free  tips  of  her  pink  toes.  She  felt  the 
maid  come  in.  "What  do  you  want,  Marie  ?" 

"Nothing,  Miss,"  said  the  maid ;  "only  I  think  some- 
thing must  of  happened." 

"Nothing,  only  something  's  happened,"  mimicked 
Folly.  "Well,  what  's  happened?" 

"It  's  Mr.  Lewis's  governor,  Miss,  please.  He  's 
here,  and  he  says  he  just  must  see  you." 

"So  you  let  him  in,  did  you?  At  half -past  ten  in 
the  morning  ?  How  much  did  he  give  you  ?" 

"Oh,  nothing  at  all,  Miss."  Marie  paused.  "He  's 
that  charming  he  did  n't  have  to  give  me  anything." 

"H— m— m !"  said  Folly.  "Well,  go  ask  him  what 
he  wants." 

"He  won't  say,  Miss.  He  's  that  troubled  he  just 
keeps  his  eyes  on  the  floor,  an'  says  as  he  has  some- 
thing private  he  must  tell  you.  Perhaps  Mr.  Lewis  has 
broke  his  leg.  I  'm  sure  I  do  n't  know." 

"Come  on,  Buggins,"  said  Miss  Delaires  to  the  mas- 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    241 

sense.  "Do  n't  you  hear  ?  There  's  a  gentleman  wait- 
ing to  see  me." 

Buggins  shook  her  head. 

"The  hour  ut  is  not  finish/'  she  said  calmly.  "Five 
minutes  yet."  And  for  five  long  minutes  Folly  had  to 
wait.  Then  the  masseuse  went  swiftly  into  action.  Off 
came  the  mask  and  the  long,  moist  bandages.  As  the 
bandages  uncoiled,  Marie  rolled  them  up  tightly  and 
placed  them,  one  after  the  other,  on  the  glass  shelves  of 
a  metal  sterilizer.  Buggins  rolled  up  her  white  sleeves, 
and  entered  forthwith  on  the  major  rite. 

First  she  massaged  Folly's  full,  round  neck;  then 
her  swift,  deep  fingers,  passed  down  one  arm  and  felt 
out  every  muscle,  every  joint,  to  the  tips  of  Folly's 
fingers.  Back  up  the  arm  again,  across  the  bosom,  and 
down  the  other  arm.  Back  to  the  neck  once  more,  and 
then  down  and  around  the  body  to  the  very  last  joint 
of  Folly's  very  last  and  very  little  toe. 

Folly  let  go  a  great  sigh,  sprang  from  the  table,  and 
stood  erect,  young  and  alive  in  every  fiber,  in  the  cen- 
ter of  the  blue  and  white  bath-rug.  The  film  of  cold 
cream  was  quite  gone.  But  the  masseuse  was  not  yet 
content.  She  caught  up  a  soft,  scented  towel  and  passed 
it  deftly  over  arms,  body,  and  legs,  not  forgetting  the 
last  little  toe.  When  she  finished,  she  was  on  her  knees. 
She  looked  up  and  nodded  to  Folly's  inquiring  glance. 

Folly   gave    a    little    laugh    of   pure    delight,    and 


242     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

stretched.  She  held  her  doubled  fists  high  above  her 
head.  Her  whole  body  glowed  in  an  even,  unblemished 
pink.  Verily,  it  seemed  to  breathe;  it  breathed  with 
the  breath  of  flowers.  And  no  wonder! 

When  she  had  finished  stretching,  Marie  was  hold- 
ing ready  a  gown  of  silk, — dark  blue,  with  a  foam  of 
lace  at  the  throat  and  on  the  broad  half-sleeves, — and 
Buggins  had  placed  lamb's-wool  slippers  just  before  her 
feet.  But  Folly  was  too  full  of  animal  to  be  even  so 
softly  imprisoned  just  yet.  With  a  chuckle  of  mischief, 
she  gave  them  each  a  quick  push  and  darted  across  the 
room  and  out  by  the  door. 

Maid  and  masseuse  followed  her  into  the  bedroom 
with  protesting  cries.  The  bedroom  had  been  put  in 
order.  Only  the  bed  itself,  dressed  merely  in  a  fresh 
white  sheet  and  pillows,  looked  a  little  naked,  for  the 
bedclothes  proper  had  been  carried  out  to  air.  In  the 
center  of  the  bed  was  Folly,  curled  up  like  a  kitten. 
Her  hair  had  tumbled  down  into  two  thick,  loose  braids. 
She  submitted  now  to  the  gown,  and  wrapped  herself 
carefully  in  it.  Propped  high  against  the  pillows,  a 
braid  of  brown  hair  falling  forward  over  each  shoulder, 
and  her  bare  arms  lying  still  at  her  sides,  she  looked 
very  demure  indeed  and  very  sweet. 

"Bring  tea,  Marie,"  she  said  softly,  "and  show  in 
Daddy  Leighton." 


CHAPTER   XXXVII 

LEIGHTON'S  first  feeling  on  entering  Folly's  bed- 
room was  one  of  despair.  All  his  knowledge  of 
the  highways  and  byways  of  the  feminine  mind  was 
only  enough  to  make  him  recognize,  as  he  glanced 
about  the  room,  that  he  was  about  to  encounter  more 
than  a  personality,  that  he  was  face  to  face  with  a  force. 

The  most  illuminating  thing  that  can  be  said  about 
Folly's  bedroom  is  that  Leighton  saw  the  bedrooom — 
the  whole  of  it — before  he  consciously  saw  Folly.  The 
first  impression  that  the  room  gave  was  one  of  fresh 
air — the  weighted  air  of  a  garden  in  bloom,  however, 
rather  than  that  of  some  wind-swept  plain.  The  next, 
was  one  of  an  even  and  almost  stolid  tone,  neither  femi- 
nine nor  masculine,  in  the  furnishings.  They  were 
masterfully  impersonal. 

To  Leighton,  who  had  had  the  run  of  every  grade 
of  greasy,  professional  dressing-room,  chaotic  and  slov- 
enly beyond  description,  and  of  boudoirs,  professional 
and  otherwise,  each  in  its  appropriate  measure  a  mirror 
of  the  character  of  its  occupant,  the  detachment  of  this 
big  room  came  as  a  shock.  There  were  only  eight  pieces 
of  furniture,  of  which  four  were  chairs,  yet  there  was 

243 


244     THBOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

no  sense  of  emptiness.     The  proportions  of  the  remain- 
ing objects  would  have  dwarfed  a  far  larger  space. 

Along  the  whole  length  of  one  wall  stood  an  enor- 
mous press  in  mahogany,  with  sliding-doors.  Two  of 
the  doors  were  slightly  open,  for  Folly  knew  that 
clothes,  like  people  and  flowers,  need  a  lot  of  air.  Leigh- 
ton  caught  a  glimpse  of  filmy  nothings  hanging  on 
racks ;  of  other  nothings,  mostly  white,  stacked  on  deep 
shelves;  of  a  cluster  of  hats  clinging  like  orchids  to 
invisible  bumps ;  and  last  and  least,  of  tiny  slippers  all 
in  a  row. 

At  right  angles  to  the  press,  but  well  away  from  it, 
stood  a  dressing-table  surmounted  by  a  wide,  low  swivel- 
mirror.  The  table  was  covered  with  tapestry  under 
glass.  The  dull  gleam  of  the  tapestry  seemed  to  tone 
down  and  control  the  glittering  array  of  toilet  articles 
in  monogrammed  gold.  Facing  the  press,  stood  a  large 
trinity  cheval-glass,  with  swinging  wings.  In  the  cen- 
ter of  the  room  was  the  bed.  Behind  the  bed  and  on 
each  side  of  it  were  two  high  windows.  They  carried 
no  hangings,  but  were  fitted  with  three  shades,  differ- 
ing in  weight  and  color,  and  with  adjustable  porcelain 
Venetian  blinds  which  could  be  made  to  exclude  light 
without  excluding  air. 

Folly's  bed  was  a  mighty  structure.  Like  the  rest 
of  the  furniture,  it  was  of  mahogany.  It  was  a  four- 
poster,  but  posts  would  be  a  misleading  term  applied  to 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     245 

the  four  fluted  pillars  that  carried  the  high  canopy. 
The  canopy  itself  was  trimmed  with  no  tassels  or  hang- 
ings except  for  a  single  hand  of  thick  tapestry  brought 
just  low  enough  to  leave  the  casual  observer  in  doubt  as 
to  whether  there  really  was  a  canopy  at  all. 

Having  taken  in  all  the  surroundings  at  a  glance, 
Leighton's  eyes  finally  fell  upon  Folly.  She  lay  in  a 
puzzling,  soft  glow  of  light.  Eesting  high  on  the  pil- 
lows, she  reached  scarcely  half-way  down  the  length  of 
the  great  bed.  For  a  second  they  looked  at  each  other 
solemnly.  Then  Leighton's  glance  passed  from  her  face 
to  the  two  braids  of  hair,  down  the  braids  to  her  bare 
arms  demurely  still  at  her  sides,  down  her  carefully 
wrapped  figure,  down,  down  to  her  pink  toes.  Folly 
was  watching  that  glance.  As  it  reached  her  toes,  she 
gave  them  a  quick  wriggle.  Leighton  jumped  as  if 
some  one  had  shot  at  him,  and  solemnity  made  a  bolt 
through  the  open  windows,  hotly  pursued  by  a  ripple 
and  a  rumble  of  laughter. 

When  Leighton  had  finished  laughing,  he  sat  down 
in  a  chair  and  sighed.  He  was  trying  to  figure  out  just 
what  horse-power  it  would  have  taken  to  drag  him  away 
from  Folly  at  Lewis's  age.  Where  was  he  going  to  find 
the  power  ?  For  the  first  time  in  many  years  he  trem- 
bled before  a  situation.  He  began  to  talk  casually,  try- 
ing to  lead  up  to  the  object  of  his  call.  Two  things, 
however,  distracted  him.  One  was  the  puzzling  glow 


246     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

of  light  that  bathed  Folly  and  the  bed,  the  other  was 
Folly  herself. 

Folly  was  very  polite  indeed  as  far  as  occasional 
friendly  interjections  went,  but  as  to  genuine  atten- 
tion she  was  distinctly  at  fault.  She  did  not  look  at 
Leighton  while  he  talked,  but  held  her  gaze  dreamily  on 
what  would  have  been  the  sky  above  her  had  not  three 
floors  of  apartments,  a  roof,  and  several  other  things 
intervened. 

Finally  Leighton  exclaimed  in  exasperation: 

"What  are  you  staring  at?" 

Folly  started  as  though  she  had  just  wakened,  and 
turned  her  eyes  on  him. 

"You  're  too  far  away,"  she  said.  "If  you  really 
want  to  talk  to  me,  come  over  here."  She  patted  the 
bed  at  her  side. 

Leighton  crossed  over,  and  sat  on  the  edge  of  the 
bed.  Something  made  him  look  up.  His  jaw  dropped. 
There  was  a  canopy  to  Folly's  bed.  It  consisted  of 
one  solid  sweep  of  French  mirror  so  limpid  that  reflec- 
tion became  reality.  It  was  fringed  with  tiny  veiled 
lights. 

Once  more  Folly's  gay  ripple  of  laughter  rang  out, 
but  it  was  unaccompanied  this  time.  Leighton's  fight- 
ing blood  was  up.  He  stared  at  her  stolidly. 

"Look  here,"  he  said,  "I  do  want  to  talk  to  you. 
Put  out  those  cursed  little  lights!" 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    247 

"Oh,  dear!"  gasped  Folly  as  she  switched  off  the 
lights,  "you  're  such  a  funny  man!  You  make  me 
laugh.  Please  do  n't  do  it  any  more." 

"I  won't  try  any  harder  than  I  have  so  far,"  said 
Leighton,  grimly.  "This  is  what  I  came  to  say  to  you. 
My  boy  wants  to  marry  you.  I  do  n't  want  him  to.  I 
might  as  well  confess  that  during  the  last  ten  minutes 
I  've  given  up  any  ideas  I  had  of  buying  you  off.  I  'm 
not  worth  a  million." 

"You  poor  dear,"  said  Folly,  "do  n't  worry  any 
longer.  I  do  n't  want  to  marry  Lew.  Ask  me  some- 
thing else." 

"I  will,"  said  Leighton.  "It  's  just  this.  Chuck 
Lew  over.  Get  rid  of  him.  It  will  hurt  him,  I  know. 
I  can  understand  that  better  now  than  I  did  before. 
But  I  'd  rather  hurt  him  a  bit  that  way  than  see  him 
on  the  rack." 

"Thanks,"  said  Folly;  "but,  you  see,  I  can't  get  rid 
of  him.  You  can't  get  rid  of  something  you  have  n't 
got."  She  smiled.  "Do  n't  you  see  ?  I  '11  have  to  get 
him  before  I  can  oblige  you." 

"Do  n't  bother,"  said  Leighton.  "A  clever  woman 
like  you  often  gets  rid  of  something  she  has  n't  got. 
Look  here,  you  do  n't  want  to  marry  Lew,  and,  what  's 
more,  you  do  n't  love  him.  You  could  n't  marry  him 
if  you  wanted  to.  You  know  it  is  n't  in  you  to  marry 
any  man.  But  I  tell  you,  Folly,  if  it  really  was  in  you 


248     THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

truly  to  marry  Lew,  I  'd  give  in  and  bless  you.  I 
would  n't  have  yesterday,  but  I  would  to-day;  because, 
my  dear,  you  are  simply  made  up  of  charms.  The  only 
thing  missing  is  a  soul." 

"You  talk  better  than  Lew — not  so  silly,"  remarked 
Folly.  "But  what  's  the  use  of  all  this  palaver  about 
marrying  ?  I  've  told  you  I  do  n't  want  to  marry  him." 

"Well,  what  do  you  want,  then?" 

"I  want  Lew,"  said  Folly,  smiling.  She  sat  up,  and 
drew  her  knees  into  the  circle  of  her  arms.  "He  's  an 
awfully  nice  boy.  So  like  you,  Marie  says.  I  just 
want  him  to  have.  You  know." 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton,  dryly.  "Well,  you  can't  have 
him." 

"Can't  have  him?"  repeated  Folly,  straightening. 
"Why  not?" 

"Because  I  do  n't  want  you  to." 

"But  why?" 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "I  do  n't  believe  in  that  sort 
of  thing." 

"Oh,  oh !"  cried  Folly,  "now  you  're  trying  to  make 
me  laugh  again!  By  the  way,  are  you  Mr.  Grapes 
Leighton  ?" 

"I  am,"  said  Leighton,  flushing. 

Folly  called  the  maid. 

"Marie,"  she  said,  "bring  me  my  scrap-book — the  old- 
est one." 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     249 

Leighton  moved  back  to  the  chair  and  sat  down  with 
a  resigned  air.  Marie  brought  in  a  huge  scrap-book, 
and  placed  it  on  a  bracket  tea-tray  that  swung  in  over 
the  bed.  Folly  opened  the  book  and  turned  the  leaves 
slowly.  "Here  we  are,"  she  said  at  last,  and  read, 
mimicking  each  speaker  to  a  turn : 

"  'Counsel :'  'Please,  Mrs.  Bing,  just  answer  yes  or 
no;  did  you  or  did  you  not  meet  Mr.  Leighton  in  the 
corridor  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning  ?' 

"  'Mrs.  Bing :'  'Well,  sir,  yes ;  sir,  that  is,  please 
your  Honor  [turning  to  the  judge],  I  did  meet  Mr. 
Leighton  in  the  collidoor,  but  'e  was  eating  of  a  bunch 
of  grapes  that  innercent  you  'd  ha'  knowed  at  once  as 
'ee  'ad  n't  been  up  to  no  mischief.'  [Laughter.] 

"Order !  Order !"  boomed  Folly,  as  she  slammed  the 
book. 

Leighton  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"That  's  neither  here  nor  there.  You  '11  find  before 
you  get  through  with  life  what  people  with  brains  have 
known  for  several  centuries.  The  son  that 's  worth  any- 
thing at  all  is  never  like  his  father.  Sons  grow." 

"I  do  n't  care  anything  about  that,"  said  Folly, 
calmly.  "I  'm  going  to  have  Lew  because — well,  just 
because  I  want  him." 

"And  I  say  you  're  not." 

"So?"  said  Folly,  her  eyes  narrowing.     Then  she 


250     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

smiled  and  added,  "There  's  only  one  way  you  can 
stop  me." 

"How  'a  that  ?"  said  Leighton. 

"By  making  me  want  somebody  else  more." 

Leighton  looked  at  her  keenly  for  a  moment. 

"I  shall  never  do  that,"  he  said. 

"Somehow,,"  said  Folly,  still  smiling,  "you  've  made 
a  fair  start.  It  is  n't  you  exactly.  It  's  that  you  are 
just  Lew — the  whole  of  Lew  and  a  lot  of  things  added." 

"You  are  blind,"  said  Leighton;  "you  do  n't  know 
the  difference  between  addition  and  subtraction.  Any- 
way, even  if  I  could  do  it,  I  would  n't.  I  want  to  fight 
fair — fair  with  Lew,  fair  with  you,  if  you  're  fair  with 
me,  and  fair  with  myself.  But  I  want  to  fight,  not 
play.  Will  you  lunch  at  our  place  to-morrow  ?" 

"Let 's  see.  To-morrow,"  said  Folly,  tapping  her  lips 
to  hide  a  tiny  yawn.  "Well,  we  can't  fight  unless  we 
get  together,  can  we?  Yes,  I  '11  come." 


CHAPTEE   XXXVIII 

IMMEDIATELY  upon  leaving  Folly,  Leighton 
called  on  Lady  Deri,  by  appointment.  He  had 
already  been  to  Helene  with  his  trouble  over  Lewis. 
It  was  she  that  had  told  him  to  see  Folly.  "In  a  case 
of  even  the  simplest  subtraction,"  Helene  had  said, 
"you  've  got  to  know  what  you  're  trying  to  subtract 
from." 

As  usual,  Leighton  was  shown  into  Helene's  intimate 
room.  He  closed  the  door  after  him  quickly. 

"Helene,"  he  said,  "where  's  the  key  ?" 

"The  key  ?    What  key  ?" 

"The  key  to  this  door.  I  want  to  lock  myself  in 
here." 

"Poor  frightened  thing!"  laughed  Helene.  "Turn 
around  and  let  me  look  at  you.  Is  your  face  scratched  ?" 

Leighton  pulled  out  a  handkerchief  and  mopped  his 
brow.  He  stared  at  each  familiar  object  in  the  room 
as  though  he  were  trying  to  recall  a  truant  mind.  Fi- 
nally his  eyes  came  around  to  Helene,  and  with  a  quick 
smile  and  the  old  toss  of  the  head  with  which  he  was 
wont  to  throw  off  a  mood,  he  brought  himself  back  to 
the  present. 

251 


252     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"With  time  and  patience,"  he  said,  as  he  sat  down, 
"anybody  can  get  a  grip  on  a  personality,  but  a  mighty 
impersonality  is  like  the  Deluge  or — or  a  steam-roller. 
Do  I  look  flattened  out  ?" 

"You  do,  rather,  for  you,"  said  Helene.  "Tell  me 
about  it  from  the  beginning."  And  Leighton  did.  It 
took  him  half  an  hour.  When  he  got  through,  she  said, 
still  smiling,  "I  'd  like  to  meet  this  Folly  person." 

"I  see  I  've  talked  for  nothing,"  said  Leighton.  "It 
is  n't  the  Folly  person  that  flattened  me  out.  It  's 
what  's  around  her,  outside  of  her." 

"That  's  what  you  think,"  said  Helene.  "But,  still, 
it  's  she  I  'd  like  to  see." 

"That  's  lucky,"  said  Leighton,  "because  you  're 
going  to." 

"When?" 

"To-morrow.     Lunch." 

"What  's  the  idea  ?" 

"The  idea  is  this.  I  've  been  looking  her  up,  view- 
ing her  cradle  and  her  mother's  cradle  and  that  sort 
of  thing.  I  'd  have  liked  to  have  viewed  her  father's 
as  well,  but  it  's  a  case  of  cherchez  I'homme" 

"Well?" 

"Well,  the  young  lady  's  an  emanation  from  sub- 
Cockneydom.  My  idea  is  that  that  kind  can't  stand  the 
table  and  grande-dame  test.  I  '11  supply  the  table,  with 
fixtures,  and  you  're  going  to  be  the  grande-dame." 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     253 

Leighton's  face  suddenly  became  boyishly  pleading. 
"Will  you,  Helene?  It  's  more  than  an  imposition  to 
ask;  it  's  an  impertinence." 

For  a  moment  Helene  was  serious  and  looked  it. 

"Glen,"  she  said,  "you  and  I  do  n't  have  to  ask  that 
sort  of  thing — not  with  each  other.  We  take  it.  Of 
course  I  '11  come.  I  '11  enjoy  it.  But — do  you  think 
she  's  really  raw  enough  to  give  herself  away?" 

"I  do  n't  know,"  said  Leighton,  gloomily.  "I  could  n't 
think  of  anything  else.  Lunch  begins  to  look  a  bit 
thin  for  the  job.  At  first  I  'd  thought  of  one  of  those 
green-eyed  Barbadian  cocktails,  followed  by  that  pale- 
eyed  Swiss  wine  of  mine  that  Ivory  calls  the  Amber 
Witch  with  the  hidden  punch.  But  I  've  given  them  up. 
You  see,  I  told  her  I  'd  play  fair  if  she  did." 

"Yes,  I  see,"  said  Helene. 

A  psychologist  would  have  liked  an  hour  to  study 
the  lightning  change  that  came  over  Folly  when,  on 
the  following  day,  she  suddenly  realized  Lady  Deri. 
Folly  had  blown  into  the  flat  like  a  bit  of  gay  thistle- 
down. For  her,  to  lunch  with  one  man  was  the  stop 
this  side  of  boredom ;  but  to  lunch  with  two  was  a  de- 
light. If  she  was  allowed  to  pick  the  other  woman, 
she  could  just  put  up  with  a  partie  carree.  But  she 
had  n't  picked  out  Lady  Deri.  Lady  Deri  was  some- 
thing that  had  never  touched  her  world  except  from  a 
box  across  the  footlights  on  an  occasional  premiere. 


254     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

One  flash  of  Folly's  eyes  took  in  Lady  Deri,  and  then 
her  long  lashes  drooped  before  Lady  Deri  had  time  to 
take  in  Folly.  Folly's  whole  self  drooped.  She  was  still 
a  bit  of  thistle-down,  but  its  pal,  the  breeze,  was  gone. 
She  crossed  the  room,  barely  touched  Helene's  hand, 
and  then  fluttered  down  to  stillness  on  the  edge  of  a 
big  chair. 

At  lunch  Leighton  made  desperate  efforts  to  start  a 
breeze  and  failed.  Folly  said  "Yes"  and  Folly  said 
"No," — very  softly,  too, — and  that  was  all.  Leighton 
stepped  on  Helene's  foot  several  times,  but  to  no  avail. 
Lady  Deri  was  watching  Folly.  "Could  she  keep  it  up  ? 
Yes,  she  could."  Lady  Deri  could  n't  talk ;  she  wanted 
to  laugh. 

Throughout  that  interminable  lunch,  Helene,  Leigh- 
ton,  and  Lewis  saw  nothing,  thought  nothing,  but  Folly, 
and,  for  all  any  one  of  them  could  see,  Folly  did  n't 
know  it.  "Oh,  you  adorable  cat!"  thought  Lady  Deri. 
"Oh,  you  adorable!"  sighed  Lewis  to  himself,  and,  in- 
wardly, Leighton  groaned,  "Oh,  you  you!" 

Within  twenty  minutes  of  leaving  the  table,  Folly 
rose  from  the  edge  of  her  chair  and  crossed  to  Lady 
Deri. 

"Good-by,"  she  breathed  shyly,  holding  out  her 
hand.  "I  must  go  now."  Lewis  sprang  up  to  accom- 
pany her.  They  could  see  he  was  aching  to  get  away 
somewhere  where  he  could  put  his  arms  around  her. 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     255 

Leighton  crossed  to  the  door  and  held  it  open.  "Good- 
by,"  said  Folly  to  him,  holding  out  her  hand.  "I  've 
had  such  a  good  time." 

At  the  word  "such,"  Leighton  winced  and  flushed. 
Then  he  grinned. 

"Good-by,  Folly,"  he  said.  "I  hope  you  '11  come 
again  when  you  're  feeling  more  like  yourself." 

He  closed  the  door  and  then  rang  for  Nelton.  Nelton 
came. 

"Bring  me  the  iodine,"  said  Leighton,  as  with  his 
handkerchief  he  stanched  the  blood  from  a  bad  scratch 
on  his  right  wrist. 

"Heavens!  Glen,"  cried  Helene,  "how  did  you  get 
that? 

"Did  n't  you  see  me  jump  when  she  said  'such'f 
asked  Leighton.  Then  they  sat  down,  and  Helene 
laughed  for  a  long  time,  while  Leighton  tried  not  to. 
"Oh,"  he  said  at  last,  "I  wish  we  did  n't  have  to  think 
of  Lew!" 

"You  may  ask  for  my  advice  now,"  said  Helene,  a  lit- 
tle breathlessly.  "I  've  got  it  ready." 

"Thank  God!"  said  Leighton.     "What  is  it?" 

"It  's  only  a  plan  to  gain  time,  after  all,"  said  He- 
lene ;  "but  that  's  what  you  want — time  for  Lew  to  get 
his  puppy  eyes  opened.  You  can  elaborate  the  idea.  I  '11 
just  give  you  the  skeleton." 

She  did,  and,  soon  after,  Leighton  saw  her  into  a 


256     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

cab.  He  went  back  to  the  flat  and  waited.  He  knew 
that  Lewis  would  not  be  gone  long.  He  would  be  too 
keen  to  hear  his  father's  and  Lady  Deri's  verdict. 

Leighton  had  just  settled  down  to  a  book  and  a  sec- 
ond cigar  when  Lewis  came  into  the  room  like  a  breeze 
that  had  only,  a  moment  to  stay. 

"Well,  Dad,"  he  cried,  "what  have  you  got  to  say 
now?  What  has  Lady  Deri  got  to  say?" 

Lewis  flung  himself  into  a  chair,  crossed  his  arms, 
and  stretched  his  legs  straight  out  before  him.  His  head 
hung  to  one  side,  and  he  was  so  confident  of  his  father's 
verdict  that  he  was  laughing  at  him  out  of  bright  eyes. 

Leighton  laid  his  book  aside  and  took  his  cigar  from 
his  mouth.  He  leaned  toward  his  son,  his  elbows  on 
his  knees. 

"Every  time  I  see  Miss  Delaires,"  he  said  slowly, 
"my  opinion  of  her  charms  and  her  accomplishments 
goes  up  with  a  leap." 

Lewis  nodded,  and  scarcely  refrained  from  saying, 
"I  told  you  so." 

Leighton's  face  remained  impassive.  "She  has  a 
much  larger  repertoire  than  I  thought,"  he  continued; 
"but  there  's  one  role  she  can't  play." 

"What  's  that  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

"Marriage." 

"Why?"   asked  Lewis,  his  face  setting.      Then  he 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     257 

blurted  out :  "I  might  as  Well  tell  you,  she  says  she  does 
n't  believe  in  marriage.  She  's  too  advanced." 

"Too  advanced!"  exclaimed  Leighton.  "Why,  my 
dear  boy,  she  has  n't  advanced  an  inch  from  the  time 
the  strongest  man  with  the  biggest  club  had  a  God-given 
right  to  the  fairest  woman  in  the  tribe  and  exercised 
it.  That  was  the  time  for  Folly  to  marry." 

"Go  easy,  Dad,"  warned  Lewis. 

"I  'm  going  to,  Boy,"  said  Leighton.  "You  hear  a 
lot  of  talk  to-day  on  the  shortcomings  of  marriage  as 
an  institution.  The  socialists  and  the  suffragists  and 
a  lot  of  other  near-sighted  people  have  got  it  into  their 
heads  that  we  've  outgrown  marriage."  Leighton  puffed 
at  his  cigar.  "Once  I  was  invited  out  to  dinner,  and 
had  to  eat  cabbage  because  there  was  nothing  else.  That 
night  I  had  the  most  terrible  dream  of  my  life.  I 
dreamed  that  instead  of  growing  up,  I  was  growing 
down,  and  that  by  morning  I  had  grown  down  so  far 
that,  when  I  tried  to  put  them  on,  I  only  reached  to 
the  crotch  of  my  trousers.  I  '11  never  forget  those  flap- 
ping, empty  legs." 

Lewis  smiled. 

"You  can  smile,"  went  on  Leighton.  "I  can't,  even 
now.  That  's  what  's  happened  to  this  age.  We  Ve 
outgrown  marriage  downward.  Your  near-sighted  peo- 
ple talk  of  contractual  agreements,  parity  of  the  sexes, 


258     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

and  of  a  lot  of  other  drugged  panaceas,  with  the  en- 
thusiasm of  a  hawker  selling  tainted  bloaters.  They 
do  n't  see  that  marriage  is  founded  on  a  rock  set  deeper 
than  the  laws  of  man.  It  's  a  rock  upon  which  their 
jerry-rigged  "ships  of  the  married  state  are  bound  to 
strike  as  long  as  there  's  any  Old  Guard  left  standing 
above  the  surge  of  leveled  humanity." 

"And  what  's  the  rock?"  asked  Lewis. 

"A  woman's  devotion,"  said  Leighton,  and  paused. 
"Devotion,"  he  went  on,  "is  an  act  of  worship,  and  of 
prayer  as  well  as  of  consecration,  only,  with  a  woman, 
it  is  n't  an  act  at  all.  Sometime  perhaps  Helene  will 
talk  to  you.  If  she  does,  you  '11  see  in  her  eyes  what 
I  'm  trying  to  tell  you  in  words." 

"And — Folly?"  said  Lewis.  His  own  pause  as- 
tounded him. 

"Yes,  Folly,"  said  Leighton.  "Well,  that  's  what 
Folly  lacks — the  key,  the  rock,  the  foundation.  The 
only  person  Folly  has  a  right  to  marry  is  herself,  and 
she  knows  it." 

Lewis  sighed  with  disappointment.  He  had  been 
so  sure.  Leighton  spoke  again. 

"One  thing  more.  Do  n't  forget  that  to-day  you  and 
I — and  Helene,  received  Folly  here  as  one  of  us." 

Lewis  looked  up.  Leighton  rose,  and  laid  one  hand 
on  his  shoulder. 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     259 

"Boy,"  he  said,  "do  n't  make  a  mistress  out  of  any- 
thing that  has  touched  Helene.  You  owe  that  to  me." 

"I  won't,  Dad,"  gulped  Lewis.  He  snatched  up  his 
hat  and  stick  and  hurried  out  into  the  open. 


CKAPTEK   XXXIX 

LEIGHTON'S  heart  ached  for  his  boy  as  he 
watched  him  go,  and  during  the  next  few  weeks 
his  pity  changed  into  an  active  anxiety.  In  setting 
that  trap — he  could  call  it  nothing  else — for  Lew,  he 
and  Helene  had  put  forces  into  conflict  that  were  not 
amenable  to  any  light  control.  Lewis  had  passed  his 
word.  Leighton  knew  he  would  never  go  back  on  it. 
On  the  other  hand,  for  the  first  time  in  all  her  life 
Folly's  primal  instinct  was  being  balked  by  a  denial 
she  could  comprehend  only  as  having  its  source  in 
Leighton  rather  than  in  Lew. 

Folly  was  being  eaten  away  by  desire.  She  was 
growing  desperate.  So  were  Marie  and  the  masseuse. 
When  a  morning  came  that  found  Folly  with  purple 
shadows  under  her  eyes  their  despair  became  terror. 

"Madame,"  cried  Marie,  "why  do  n't  you  marry  him  ? 
You  've  got  to  stop  it.  You  've  got  to  stop  it.  Any- 
way, all  ways,  you  've  got  to  stop  it.  It  's  a-eating  of 
you  up.  If  you  're  a  loving  of  him  that  much,  why 
do  n't  cher?" 

"Loving  of  him!"  sneered  Folly.  "I — 'I  hate  him. 
No,  no,  that  's  not  true.  I  do  n't  hate  Lew,  poor  dear. 

260 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    261 

It 's  them  I  hate.  And  I  won't  be  beaten."  She  pounded 
her  doubled  knee  with  her  fist.  "I  do  n't  want  to  marry 
him;  but  if  they  push  me,  if  they  keep  on  pushing 
me " 

It  can  be  seen  from  the  above  that  Lew  was  begin- 
ning to  get  on  Folly's  nerves.  She  had  long  since  be- 
gun to  get  on  his.  When  they  were  with  others  it  was 
all  right;  Folly  was  her  old  self.  But  whenever  they 
were  alone,  the  same  wordy  battle  began  and  never 
ended.  Lew  grew  morose,  heavy.  He  avoided  his 
father,  but  he  could  do  no  work;  so  time  hung  on  his 
hands,  and  began  to  rot  away  his  fiber  as  only  too  much 
time  can. 

One  day  Helene  sent  for  Leighton. 

"Glen,"  she  said,  "we  've  been  playing  with  some- 
thing bigger  than  merely  Folly.  I  saw  her  to-day,  just 
a  flash  in  Bond  Street.  I  saw  her  face.  If  Lew  holds 
out  another  week,  she  's  going  to  marry  him,  and  yet, 
somehow,  I  do  n't  believe  she  loves  him.  Something 
tells  me  you  were  n't  wrong  when  you  said  she  could 
love  nothing  but  just  herself." 

Leighton  sighed. 

"I  know  I  was  n't  wrong,"  he  said.  "But  you  are 
right:  she  's  going  to  marry  him.  And  I  '11  have  to 
stand  by  and  see  him  through.  Watch  her  break  him  up 
and  throw  him  off.  And  I  '11  have  to  pick  up  the  pieces 
and  stick  them  together.  One  does  n't  like  to  have  to 


262    THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

do  that  sort  of  thing  twice.  I  did  it  with  my  own  life. 
I  do  n't  want  to  do  it  with  Lew's.  There  are  such  a 
lot  of  patched  lives.  I  wanted  him — I  wanted  him " 

Helene  crossed  the  room  quickly,  and  put  her  arms 
around  Leighton,  one  hand  pressing  his  head  to  her. 

"Glen,"  she  said  softly,  "why,  Glen!" 

Leighton  was  not  sobbing.  He  was  simply  quivering 
from  head  to  toe — quivering  so  that  he  could  not  speak. 
His  teeth  chattered.  Helene  smoothed  his  brow  and  his 
crisp  hair,  shot  with  gray.  She  soothed  him. 

"Helene,"  he  said  at  last,  "he  's  my  boy." 

"Glen,"  said  Helene,  "if  you  love  him — love  him  like 
that,  she  can't  break  him  up.  Do  n't  be  frightened.  Go 
and  find  him.  Send  him  to  me." 

Leighton  did  not  have  to  look  for  Lew.  He  had 
scarcely  reached  the  flat  when  Lew  came  rushing  in,  a 
transformed  Lew,  radiant,  throbbing  with  happiness. 

"Dad,"  he  cried,  "she  's  said  'Yes.'  She  's  going  to 
marry  me.  Do  you  hear,  Dad  ?" 

"Yes,  I  hear,"  said  Leighton,  dully.  Then  he  tossed 
back  his  head.  He  would  not  blur  Lew's  happy  hour. 
He  held  out  his  hand.  "I  hear,"  he  repeated,  "and  I 
'11 — I  '11  see  you  through." 

Lewis  gripped  the  extended  hand  with  all  his  strength, 
then  he  sat  down  and  chatted  eagerly  for  half  an  hour. 
He  did  not  see  that  his  father  was  tired. 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    263 

"Go  and  tell  Helene,"  he  said  when  Lewis  at  last 
paused.  "Telephone  her  that  you  want  to  talk  to  her." 

Helene  was  on  the  point  of  going  out.  She  told  Lewis 
to  come  and  see  her  at  ten  the  next  morning.  He  went, 
and  as  he  was  standing  just  off  the  hall,  waiting  to  he 
announced,  the  knocker  on  the  great  front  door  was 
raised,  and  fell  with  a  resounding  clang.  Before  the 
doorman  could  open,  it  fell  again. 

Lewis,  startled,  looked  around.  The  door  opened. 
A  large  man  in  evening  dress  staggered  in.  His  clothes 
were  in  disorder.  His  high  hat  had  been  rubbed  the 
wrong  way  in  spots.  But  Lewis  hardly  noticed  the 
clothes.  His  eyes  were  fastened  on  the  man's  face.  It 
was  bloated,  pouched,  and  mottled  with  purple  spots 
and  veins.  Fear  filled  it.  Not  a  sudden  fear,  but 
fear  that  was  ingrown,  that  proclaimed  that  face  its 
habitual  habitation.  The  man's  eyes  bulged  and  stared, 
yet  saw  nothing  that  was.  He  blundered  past  the  door- 
man. 

Lewis  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  tawdry  woman  peering 
out  from  a  hansom  at  the  disappearing  man.  "Thank 
Gawd !"  he  heard  her  say  as  the  cab  drove  off. 

With  one  hand  on  the  wall  the  man  guided  himself 
toward  the  stairs  at  the  end  of  the  hall.  On  the  first 
step  he  stumbled  and  would  have  fallen  had  it  not  been 
for  a  quick  footman.  The  man  recovered  his  balance 
and  struck  viciously  at  the  servant.  Then  he  clutched 


264     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

the   baluster,    and   stumbled   his   way   up   the   stairs. 

Lewis  was  frightened.  He  turned  and  hurried  through 
the  great,  silent  drawing-rooms,  through  the  somber 
library,  to  the  little  passage  to  Helene's  room.  He  met 
the  footman  who  had  gone  to  announce  him.  He  did 
not  stop  to  hear  what  he  said.  He  pushed  by  him  and 
knocked  at  Helene's  door. 

"Come  in,"  she  cried. 

Lewis  stood  before  her.     He  was  excited. 

"Helene,"  he  said,  "there  's  a  man  come  in — a  horri- 
ble man.  He  pushed  by  the  servants.  He  's  gone  up- 
stairs. I  think — well,  I  think  he  's  not  himself.  Do 
you  want  me  to  do  anything?" 

Helene  was  standing.  At  Lewis's  first  words  she  had 
flushed;  then  she  turned  pale,  deathly  pale,  and  stead- 
ied herself  with  one  hand  on  the  back  of  a  chair.  She 
put  the  other  hand  to  the  side  of  her  head  and  pressed 
it  there. 

"That  's  it,"  she  said;  "he  's— he  's  not  himself." 
Then  she  faced  Lewis.  "Lew,  that  's  my — that  's  Lord 
Deri  that  you  saw." 

"Helene !"  cried  Lew,  putting  out  quick  hands  toward 
her.  "Oh,  I  'm  sorry — I  'm  sorry  I  said  that !" 

His  contrition  was  so  deep,  so  true,  that  Helene 
smiled,  to  put  him  at  his  ease. 

"It  's  all  right,  Lew;  it  's  all  right  that  you  saw," 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     265 

she  said  evenly.  "Come  here.  Sit  down  here.  Now, 
what  have  you  got  to  tell  me?" 

Lewis  was  still  frowning. 

"It  seemed,"  he  said,  "such  a  big  thing.  Now,  some- 
how, it  does  n't  seem  so  big.  I  just  wanted  to  tell  you 
that  Folly  has  come  around  at  last.  We  're  going  to 
be  married." 

For  a  long  moment  there  was  silence,  then  Helene 
said:  "You  love  her,  Lew?  You  're  sure  you  love 
her?" 

Lewis  nodded  his  head  vehemently. 

"And  you  're  sure  she  loves  you  ?"  asked  Helene. 

"Yes,"  said  Lewis,  not  so  positively.  "In  her  way 
she  does.  She  says  she  's  wanted  me  from  the  first 
day  she  saw  me." 

Helene  sat  down.  She  held  one  knee  in  her  locked 
hands.  Her  face  was  half  turned  from  Lewis.  She 
was  staring  out  through  the  narrow,  Gothic  panes  of 
the  broad  window.  Her  face  was  still  pale  and  set. 
Lewis's  eyes  swept  over  her.  Her  beauty  struck  him 
as  never  before.  Something  had  been  added  to  it. 
Helene  seemed  to  him  a  girl,  a  frail  girl.  How  could 
he  ever  have  thought  this  woman  worldly!  Her  fra- 
grance reached  him.  It  was  a  fragrance  that  had  no 
weight,  but  it  bound  him — bound  him  hand  and  foot 
in  its  gossamer  web.  He  felt  that  he  ought  to  strug- 


266     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

gle,  but  that  he  did  not  wish  to.  He  waited  for  Helene 
to  speak. 

"Love,"  she  said  at  last,  "is  a  terrible  thing.  Young 
people  do  n't  know  what  a  terrible  thing  it  is.  We  talk 
about  the  word  'love'  being  so  abused.  We  think  we 
abuse  it,  but  it  's  love  that  abuses  itself.  There  are 
so  many  kinds  of  love,  and  every  big  family  is  bound 
to  include  a  certain  number  of  rotters.  Love  is  n't 
terrible  through  the  things  we  do  to  it;  it  's  terrible 
for  the  things  it  does  to  us." 

Helene  paused. 

"I  'm  glad  you  saw  what  you  did  to-day  because  it 
will  make  it  easier  for  you  to  understand.  Your  father 
loves  me,  and  I  love  him.  It  's  not  the  love  of  youth. 
It  's  the  love  of  sanity.  The  love  of  sanity  is  a  fine, 
stalwart  love,  but  it  has  n't  the  unnamable  sweetness 
or  the  ineffaceable  bitterness  of  the  love  of  youth.  Years 
ago  your  father  wanted  to  take  me  away  from — from 
what  you  saw.  There  did  not  seem  to  be  any  reason 
why  we  should  not  go.  He  and  I — we  're  not  wedded 
to  any  place  or  to  any  time.  We  have  a  world  that  's 
ours  alone.  We  could  take  it  with  us  wherever  we 
went." 

"Helene,"  whispered  Lewis,  "why  did  n't  you  go?" 

"Helene  unlocked  her  hands,  put  them  on  the  lounge 
at  her  sides,  and  stayed  herself  on  them.  She  stared 
at  the  floor. 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    267 

"We  did  n't  go,"  she  said,  "because  of  the  terrible 
things  that  love — bitter  love — had  done  to  us." 

She  turned  luminous  eyes  toward  Lewis. 

"You  say  you  love  Folly;  you  think  she  loves  you. 
Lew,  perhaps,  she  is  your  pal  to-day.  Will  she  be  your 
pal  always?  You  know  what  a  pal  is.  You  've  told 
me  about  that  little  girl  Natalie.  A  pal  is  one  who  can't 
do  wrong,  who  can't  go  wrong,  who  can't  grow  wrong. 
Your  pal  is  you — your  blood,  your  body,  your  soul.  Is 
Folly  your  blood,  your  body,  your  soul  ?  If  she  is,  she 
'11  grow  finer  and  finer  and  you  will,  too,  and  years 
and  time  and  place  will  fade  away  before  the  greatest 
battle-cry  the  world  has  ever  known — 'We  're  part- 
ners.' " 

Helene  turned  her  eyes  away. 

"But  if  you  're  not  really  pals  for  always,  the  one 
that  does  n't  care  will  grow  coarse.  If  it  's  Folly,  her 
past  will  seize  upon  her.  She  '11  run  from  your  con- 
demning eyes,  but  you — you  can't  run  from  your  own 
soul. 

"Lew,  I  know.  I  'm  awake.  Every  woman  has  a 
right  to  an  awakening,  but  most  of  them  by  good  for- 
tune miss  it.  There  's  one  in  ten  that  does  n't.  I  did 
n't.  The  tenth  woman- -that  's  what  I  'm  coming  to, 
and  whether  it  's  the  tenth  woman  or  the  tenth  man, 
it  's  all  the  same  in  bitter  love." 

Helene's  eyes  took  on  the  far-away  look  that  blots 


268     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

crat  the  present  world,  and  clothes  a  distant  vision  in 
flesh  and  blood. 

"You  saw  what  you  saw  to-day,"  she  went  on  in  a 
voice  so  low  that  Lewis  leaned  forward  to  catch  her 
words.  "Remember  that,  and  then  listen.  The  love 
that  comes  to  youth  is  like  the  dawn  of  day.  There 
is  no  resplendent  dawn  without  a  sun,  nor  does  the 
flower  of  a  woman's  soul  open  to  a  lesser  light.  The 
tenth  woman,"  she  repeated,  "the  one  woman.  To  her, 
awakening  comes  with  a  man,  not  through  him.  He 
is  part  of  the  dawn  of  life,  and  though  clouds  may 
later  hide  his  shining  face,  her  heart  remembers  for- 
ever the  glory  of  the  morning." 

The  tears  welled  from  her  eyes  unheeded.  Lewis 
leaped  forward  with  a  cry. 

"Helene!   Helene!" 

She  held  him  off. 

"Do  n't  touch  me !"  she  gasped.  "I  only  wanted  you 
to  see  the  whole  burden  of  love.  Now  go,  dear.  Please 
go.  I  'm — I  'm  very  tired." 


CHAPTEK   XL 

LEWIS,  walking  rapidly  toward  the  flat,  was  think- 
ing over  all  that  Lady  Deri  had  said  and  was 
trying  to  bring  Folly  into  line  with  his  thoughts.  He 
had  never  pictured  Folly  old.  He  tried  now  and  failed. 
Folly  and  youth  were  inseparable;  Folly  was  youth. 
Then  he  gave  up  thinking  of  Folly.  That  moment  did 
not  belong  to  her.  As  once  before,  the  fragrance  and 
the  memory  of  Helene  clung  to  him,  held  him. 

He  passed  slowly  into  the  room  where  Leighton  sat. 
He  felt  a  dread  lest  his  father  ask  him  what  it  was 
Helene  had  said.  But  he  wronged  his  father.  Leigh- 
ton  merely  glanced  up,  flashed  a  look  into  the  eyes  of 
his  son.  He  saw  and  knew  the  light  that  was  there 
for  the  light  that  lingers  in  the  eyes  of  him  who  comes 
from  looking  upon  holy  inner  places. 

For  an  hour  neither  spoke,  then  Leighton  said : 

"Going  out  to  lunch  to-day?" 

"No,"  said  Lewis;  "I  Ve  told  Helton  I  'd  be  in." 

"About  this  marriage,"  said  Leighton,  smiling.  "Let 
's  look  on  it  as  a  settled  thing  that  there  's  going  to  be 
a  marriage.  Have  you  thought  about  the  date  and  ways 
and  means?" 

269 


270     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  flushed. 

"Do  n't  misunderstand  me,"  said  Leighton.  "I  might 
as  well  tell  you  that  I  've  decided  to  divide  my  income 
equally  between  us,  marriage  or  no  marriage." 

"Dad!"  cried  Lewis,  half  protesting. 

"There,  there,"  said  Leighton,  "you  're  not  getting 
from  me  what  you  think.  What  I  mean  is  that  I  'm 
not  making  any  sacrifice.  I  've  lived  on  half  my  in- 
come for  some  time.  You  '11  need  a  lump-sum  of  money 
besides.  Your  grandmother  left  you  a  big  house  in  Al- 
bany. It  won't  bring  much,  but  I  think  you  'd  better 
sell  it.  It  's  on  the  wrong  side  of  the  town  now." 

"I  '11  do  whatever  you  say,  Dad,"  said  Lewis. 

"I  suggest  that  you  fix  your  marriage  for  six  months 
from  now,"  went  on  Leighton.  "That  will  give  us 
time  to  go  over  and  untangle  certain  affairs,  including 
the  house,  on  the  other  side.  It  is  n't  altogether  on 
account  of  the  house  I  want  to  take  you  over." 

Lewis  had  winced  at  six  months.  Now  he  looked 
questioningly  at  his  father. 

"Keep  your  eyes  open  as  you  go  through  life,"  con- 
tinued Leighton,  "and  you  '11  see  that  marriage  is  a 
great  divisor.  All  the  sums  of  friendship  and  rela- 
tion are  cut  in  two  by  marriage.  You  and  I,  we  've 
been  friends,  and  before  I  surrender  you  I  think  it  's 
only  just  that  I  should  take  you  over  and  introduce  you 
to  vour  inheritance." 


THKOUGH    STAINED   GLASS     271 

"My  inheritance?"  asked  Lewis. 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton,  "your  country." 

"You  might  think,"  continued  Leighton,  "that  I  'm 
an  expatriate.  Externally  I  have  been,  but  never  in 
the  heart.  I  've  been  waiting — waiting  for  our  country 
to  catch  up  to  me.  Under  certain  conditions  a  man 
has  the  right  to  pick  out  the  stage  of  civilization  best 
adapted  to  his  needs.  There  are  two  ways  of  doing  that : 
either  go  to  it  or  make  it  come  to  you.  If  you  're  not 
tied,  it  's  easier  to  go  to  it,  because  sometimes  it  takes 
more  than  a  generation  to  make  it  come  to  you." 

"So  you  've  gone  to  it,"  said  Lewis. 

Leighton  nodded. 

"Nations  and  individuals  travel  like  the  hands  of  a 
clock.  You  can't  always  live  in  the  midday  of  your 
life,  but  you  can  in  the  midday  of  a  nation.  When 
you  get  an  educated  taste,  you  prefer  pheasants,  bana- 
nas, Stilton,  and  nations  when  they  're  at  one  o'clock. 
The  best  flavor — I  'm  not  talking  about  emotions — the 
best  flavor  of  anything,  including  life,  comes  with  one 
o'clock." 

"What  time  is  it  over  there  now  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

"About  eleven,"  said  Leighton,  "top  wave  of  success. 
ISTow,  these  are  the  earmarks  of  success:  a  meticulous 
morality  in  trifles,  ingrowing  eyes,  crudity,  enthusiasm, 
and  a  majority." 

"Heavens !"  cried  Lewis,  "you  told  me  once  you  were 


272     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

afraid  I  was  going  to  be  successful.  Am  I  earmarked 
like  that?" 

"You  will  be,"  said  Leighton,  "the  minute  you  're 
driven  to  sculpturing  for  the  populace — for  what  it 
will  bring.  That  's  why  I  'm  giving  you  your  own 
income  now,  because,  when  you  're  married,  you  're 
going  to  be  pretty  hard  pressed.  I  do  n't  want  you  to 
be  able  to  justify  the  sale  of  your  soul. 

"I  had  an  uncle  once — he  's  dead  now — that  had  an 
only  son  named  Will.  Uncle  Jim  was  a  hard  worker. 
He  had  a  paper-mill,  and  he  was  worth  a  lot  of  money. 
His  son  Will  was  n't  a  worker.  He  did  n't  own  the 
paper-mill,  but  he  never  let  you  forget  he  was  going  to. 
He  failed  his  way  through  school,  but  he  could  n't  quite 
fail  through  college.  Every  time  he  failed  at  any- 
thing, he  used  to  say:  'It  does  n't  matter.  Dad  will 
give  me  a  start  in  life,  won't  you,  Dad?'  And  his 
father  would  say,  'I  certainly  will.' 

"Well,  one  morning  a  little  after  Will  had  been 
flunked  out  of  college,  he  was  standing  on  the  lawn 
whittling.  I  happened  to  be  looking  out  of  the  win- 
dow. I  saw  Uncle  Jim  crawling  across  the  grass  under 
cover  of  a  rhododendron  bush  to  a  position  just  behind 
Will.  He  was  carrying  under  one  arm  an  enormous 
fire-cracker,  with  the  fuse  lit.  He  rolled  it  out  on 
the  grass  behind  Will,  and  when  it  went  off,  Will  went, 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     2T3 

too.  He  landed  seventeen  feet  from  the  hole  the  cracker 
made. 

"When  he  'd  turned  around,  but  before  he  could 
get  his  jaw  up,  my  uncle  said :  'Will,  I  've  always  prom- 
ised I  'd  give  you  a  start  in  life.  Well,  I  Ve  given  it 
to  you — a  damn  good  start,  too,  judging  by  the  length 
of  that  jump.  Now  you  git !  Not  a  word.  You  just 
git!' 

"Will  did  n't  go  very  far  away.  He  went  to  the 
rival  town  across  the  river.  He  had  n't  learned  any- 
thing about  making  paper,  but  a  New  England  Leigh- 
ton  is  just  naturally  born  knowing  how  to  make  paper. 
In  fifteen  years  Will  did  n't  have  much  soul  left,  but 
he  had  enough  money  to  buy  his  father  out  and  make 
him  sign  an  agreement  to  retire.  They  were  both  as 
pleased  as  Punch.  To  the  day  of  his  death  the  old 
man  would  say,  'I  certainly  gave  you  a  start  in  life, 
Will,'  and  Will  would  answer  with  a  grin,  'Dad,  you 
certainly  did.' 

"The  moral  of  that  yarn  is  that  we  Leightons  have 
proved  over  and  over  that  we  could  play  the  game  of 
success  when  we  thought  it  was  worth  while.  Will's 
generation  and  mine,  generally  speaking,  thought  it  was 
worth  while.  But  your  generation — the  best  of  it — is 
n't  going  to  think  so.  That  's  why  I  'm  giving  you 
enough  money  so  that  you  won't  have  to  think  about 
it  all  the  time." 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"I  'm  grateful,  Dad,"  said  Lewis.  "It  's  easier  to 
breathe  that  way." 

Leighton  nodded.  "Sometimes,"  he  continued,  "I 
feel  guilty,  as  though  it  were  cowardly  not  to  have 
lived  where  I  was  put.  But — have  you  ever  seen  a 
straw,  caught  on  a  snag,  try  to  stop  a  river?  To  your 
sentimentalist  that  straw  looks  heroic;  to  anybody  that 
knows  the  difference  between  bathos  and  pathos  it  sim- 
ply looks  silly.  The  river  of  life  is  bigger  than  that 
of  any  nation.  We  can't  stop  it,  but  we  can  swell  it  by 
going  with  it.  Did  you  ever  see  a  mule  drink  against 
the  current?" 

"No,"  said  Lewis,  his  eyes  lighting  with  memory  of  a 
thing  that  he  knew. 

"Did  you  ever  see  free  cattle  face  a  gale  ?" 

"No,"  said  Lewis  again. 

"Out  of  the  mouths  of  the  dumb  come  words  of 
wisdom,"  said  Leighton.  "Go  with  life,  Boy.  Don't 
get  stranded  on  a  snag.  You  '11  only  look  silly.  I  'm 
glad  you  've  traveled  around  a  bit,  because  the  wider 
the  range  of  your  legs  the  wider  your  range  of  vision, 
and,  let  me  tell  you,  you  '11  need  a  mighty  broad  field 
of  sight  to  take  in  America  and  the  Americans. 

"Your  country  and  mine  is  a  national  paradox.  It 
's  the  only  country  where  you  can't  buy  little  things  for 
money.  For  instance,  you  can't  buy  four  seats  that 
somebody  else  '.as  a  right  to  from  a  railway  conductor 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     275 

for  sixty-two  and  a  half  cents.  There  is  n't  any  price 
at  which  you  can  get  an  American  to  say,  'Yes,  sir, 
thank  you,  sir,'  every  time  he  does  anything  for  you." 

"Lunch  is  served,  sir,  thank  you,  sir,"  announced  the 
impassive  JSTelton  from  the  doorway. 

Lewis  smiled,  and  then  laughed  at  his  father's  face. 

"Nelton,"  said  Leighton,  "did  you  hear  what  I  was 
saying  ?" 

"I  did,  sir,  thank " 

"Yes,  yes,"  broke  in  Leighton,  "we  know.  Well,  Nel- 
ton,  your  pay  is  raised.  Ten  per  cent." 

"Yes,  sir,"  said  Nelton,  unmoved.  "Thank  you, 
sir." 

"As  I  was  saying,"  continued  Leighton  to  Lewis,  "a 
country  wjbere  money  can't  buy  little  things.  A  leveled 
country  where  there  's  less  under  dog  than  anywhere 
else  on  the  face  of  the  earth.  A  people  that  's  more 
communal  and  less  socialistic  than  any  other  common- 
wealth. A  happy  nation,  my  boy — a  happy  nation  of 
discontented  units.  Do  you  get  that  ?  Of  discontented 
units." 

"Yes,  I  think  I  do,"  said  Lewis. 

"You  do  n't,  but  you  will  in  time,"  said  Leighton. 


CHAPTER   XLI 

WHEN"  Lewis  burst  upon  Folly  with  the  news 
that  his  father  had  given  not  only  consent  to 
the  marriage,  but  half  his  income  to  smooth  the  way 
to  it,  Folly  frowned.  What  was  the  game?  she  won- 
dered. But  the  first  thing  she  asked  was: 

"And  how  much  is  that  ?" 

Lewis  stammered,  and  said  really  he  did  n't  know, 
which  made  Folly  laugh.  Then  he  told  her  about  the 
six  months  and  the  trip  to  America.  Whereupon  Folly 
nodded  her  head  and  said: 

"Oh,  that  's  it,  is  it  ?  Well,  your  governor  is  willing 
to  pay  pretty  thick  for  six  months  of  you.  All  I  want  to 
know  is,  Will  you  come  back  to  me?" 

"Come  back  to  you,  Folly  ?"  cried  Lewis,  "Of  course 
I'll  come  back  to  you.  Why,  that  's  just  what  I  'm 
going  for.  To  sell  the  house  and  fix  things  so  I  can 
come  back  to  you." 

At  the  same  hour  Leighton  was  saying  good-by  to 
Helene.  He  had  not  really  come  to  say  good-by.  He 
had  come  to  thank  her  for  her  sacrifice,  for  the  things 
he  knew  she  had  said  to  Lew.  He  did  not  try  to  thank 
her  in  words.  A  boyish  glance,  an  awkward  movement, 

276 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     277 

a  laugh  that  broke — these  things  said  more4o  Helene 
than  words. 

"So  you  've  got  six  months'  grace,"  said  Helene,  when 
Leighton  had  told  her  how  things  stood.  "Glen,  do  you 
remember  this :  'All  erotic  love  is  a  progression.  There 
is  no  amatory  affection  that  can  stand  the  strain  of  a 
separation  of  six  months  in  conjunction  with  six  thou- 
sand miles.  All  the  standard  tales  of  grande  passion 
and  absence  are '  " 

"  'Legendary  hypotheses  based  on  a  neurotic  founda- 
tion,' "  finished  Leighton.  "Yes,  I  remember  that  the- 
ory of  mine.  I  'm  building  on  it." 

"I  thought  you  were,"  said  Helene.  "Do  n't  build 
too  confidently.  Lew  has  a  strain  of  constancy  in  him. 
It  's  quite  unconscious,  but  it  's  there.  Just  add  my 
theory  to  yours." 

"What  's  your  theory  ?"  asked  Leighton. 

"My  theory,"  said  Helene,  "is  that  little  girl  Nata- 
lie. I  do  n't  suppose  she  's  little  now." 

Leighton  frowned. 

"Do  you  know  where  Natalie  is  living  ?  She  's  there." 
His  brow  clouded  with  thoughts  of  the  scene  of  his 
bitter  love. 

Helene  understood. 

"I  know.     I  thought  so,"  she  said. 

"I  '11  send  Lewis  to  her." 


278     THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

"No,  Glen,"  said  Helene  softly,  "you  '11  take  him  to 
her." 

When  all  was  ready  for  the  start,  Nelton  appeared 
before  Leighton. 

"Please,  sir,"  he  said,  "I  've  taken  the  liberty  of 
packing  my  bags,  too,  thank,  you,  sir.  I  thought,  sir, 
since  you  're  both  going,  the  flat  might  be  locked  up." 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "I  suppose  it  might  for  once. 
Where  are  you  off  to?" 

"Why,  with  you,  sir.  If  you  do  n't  mind,  sir,  I  'd 
like  to  see  this  America." 

Leighton  smiled. 

"Come  along,  by  all  means,  Nelton,"  he  said.  "Go 
ahead  with  the  baggage,  and  see  that  Master  Lewis 
and  I  get  a  compartment  to  ourselves.  Here  's  half  a 
crown." 

Leighton  and  Lewis  were  not  traveling  with  the  rush 
of  the  traffic.  It  was  too  early  in  the  year.  While  the 
boat  was  not  crowded,  it  was  by  no  means  deserted.  It 
had  just  that  number  of  passengers  on  board  which 
an  old  traveler  would  like  to  stipulate  for  on  buying  his 
ticket;  enough  to  keep  the  saloons  from  hollow  echoes, 
and  not  enough  to  block  even  a  single  deck. 

"Are  these  all  Americans  ?"  asked  Lewis  on  their 
third  day  out. 

Leighton  glanced  rapidly  up  and  down  the  deck. 

"No,"  he  said,  "there  's  hardly  a  typical  American 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    279 

in  the  lot.  Wrong  time  of  year.  You  see  there  are 
more  men  than  women.  That  's  a  sure  sign  this  is  n't 
an  American  pleasure-boat.  There  are  a  good  many 
English  on  board,  the  traveling  kind.  They  're  going 
over  to  'do'  America  before  the  heat  comes  on.  What 
Americans  you  see  are  tainted." 

"What  's  a  tainted  American?"  asked  Lewis. 

"I  'm  a  tainted  American,  and  you  are,"  said  Leigh- 
ton.  "A  tainted  American  is  one  who  has  lived  so  long 
abroad  that  he  goes  to  America  on  business." 


CHAPTEK    XLII 

THE  house  that  Aunt  Jed  had  left  to  Natalie  stood 
on  the  lip  of  a  vast  basin.    From  its  veranda  one 
looked  down  into  a  peaceful  cup  of  life.    The  variegated 
green  of  the  valley  proclaimed  to  the  wandering  eye, 

"All  sorts  are  here  that  all  the  earth  yields  I 
Variety  without  end." 

There  was  a  patchwork  of  fields  bordered  with  gray 
stone  walls,  of  stray  bits  of  pasture,  of  fallow  meadow 
and  glint  of  running  water,  of  woodland,  orchard,  and 
the  habitations  of  man*made  still  by  distance. 

Aunt  Jed's  house  was  not  on  the  highway.  The 
highway  was  miles  off,  and  cut  the  far  side  of  the  basin 
in  a  long,  straight  slant.  On  that  gash  of  white  one 
could  see  occasional  tiny  motor-cars  hurrying  up  and 
down  like  toys  on  a  taut  string.  Only  one  motor,  a 
pioneer  car,  had  struggled  up  the  road  that  led  past 
Natalie's  door,  and  immediately  after,  that  detour  had 
been  marked  as  impassable  on  all  the  best  maps. 

In  fact,  the  road  up  to  Aunt  Jed's  looked  more  like 
a  river-bed  than  a  road.  It  had  a  gully  and  many 
"thank-you-ma'ams."  It  was  plentifully  sown  with 

280 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     281 

pebbles  as  big  as  your  head  and  hard  as  flint,  which 
gave  tit  for  tat  to  every  wheel  that  struck  them.  Every 
time  Mrs.  Leighton  ventured  in  Natalie's  cart — and 
it  was  seldom  indeed  except  to  go  to  church — she  would 
say,  "We  really  must  have  this  road  fixed." 

But  Natalie  would  only  laugh  and  say, 

"Not  a  bit  of  it.    I  like  it  that  way." 

Natalie  had  bought  for  a  song  a  little  mare  named 
Gipsy.  Nobody,  man  or  woman,  could  drive  Gip;  she 
just  went.  Whoever  rode,  held  on  and  prayed  for  her 
to  stop.  Gip  hated  that  road  down  into  the  valley.  If 
she  could  have  gone  from  top  to  bottom  in  one  jump, 
she  would  have  done  it.  As  it  was,  she  did  the  next 
best  thing.  What  made  you  love  Gip  was  that  she  came 
up  the  hill  almost  as  fast  as  she  went  down. 

Soon  after  Gip  became  Natalie's,  she  awoke  to  find 
herself  famous  from  an  attempt  to  pass  over  and 
through  a  stalled  motor-car.  After  that  the  farmers 
used  to  keep  an  eye  out  for  her,  especially  on  Sundays, 
and  give  her  the  whole  road  when  they  saw  her  coming. 
Ann  Leighton  said  it  was  undignified  to  go  to  church 
like  that,  to  which  Natalie  replied: 

"Think  what  it  's  doing  for  your  color,  Mother.  Be- 
sides, think  of  church.  You  must  admit  that  church 
here  has  gone  a  bit  tough.  I  really  could  n't  stand  it 
except  sandwiched  between  two  slices  of  Gip." 

Aunt  Jed's  house — nobody  ever  called  it  anything  else 


282     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

— was  typical  of  the  old  New  England  style,  except  that 
a  broad  veranda  had  been  added  to  the  length  of  the 
front  by  the  generation  that  had  outraged  custom  and 
reduced  the  best  parlor  and  the  front  door  to  every- 
day uses.  This  must  have  happened  many  years  before 
Natalie's  advent,  for  a  monster  climbing  rose  of  hardy 
disposition  had  more  than  half  covered  the  veranda 
before  she  came. 

The  house  itself  was  of  clapboards  painted  white,  and 
stood  four  square ;  its  small-paned  windows,  flanked  with 
green  shutters,  blinking  toward  the  west.  It  had  a  very 
prim  air,  said  to  have  been  absorbed  from  Aunt  Jed, 
and  seemed  to  be  eternally  trying  to  draw  back  its 
skirts  from  contact  with  the  interloping  veranda  and 
the  rose-tree,  which,  toward  the  end  of  the  flowering 
season,  certainly  gave  it  a  mussed  appearance.  At  such 
times,  if  the  great  front  door  was  left  open  on  a  warm 
day,  the  house  took  on  a  look  of  open-mouthed  horror, 
which  immediately  relapsed  to  primness  once  the  door 
was  closed. 

Natalie  was  the  discoverer  of  this  evidence  of  per- 
sonality. Sitting  under  the  two  giant  elms  that  were 
the  sole  ornament  of  the  soft  old  lawn,  she  suddenly 
caught  the  look  on  the  face  of  the  house,  and  called 
out: 

"Mother,  come  here !    Come  quickly !"  as  though  the 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     283 

look  could  n't  possibly  last  through  Mrs.  Leighton's 
leisurely  approach. 

"What  is  it,  dear?"  asked  Mrs.  Leighton. 

"Why,  the  house !"  said  Natalie.  "Look  at  it.  It  'B 
horrified  at  something.  I  think  it  must  be  the  mess 
the  roses  have  made.  Can't  you  see  what  it  's  saying? 
It  's  saying,  'Well,  I  never !' ' 

Mrs.  Leighton  laughed. 

"It  does  look  sort  of  funny,"  she  said. 

Just  then  old  mammy  put  her  gray  head  out  of  the 
door  to  hear  what  the  talk  was  about.  She  wore  glasses, 
as  becoming  to  her  age,  but  peered  over  them  when  she 
wanted  to  see  anything. 

"What  youans  larffin'  abeout?"  she  demanded. 

"We  're  laughing  at  the  house,"  cried  Natalie.  "It 
's  got  its  mouth  open  and  the  funniest  look  on  its  face. 
Come  and  see." 

"Mo'  nonsense,"  grunted  mammy  and  slammed  the 
door. 

Then  it  was  that  the  house  seemed  to  withdraw  sud- 
denly into  the  primness  of  virginal  white  paint. 

"That  's  what  it  wanted,"  cried  Natalie,  excitedly — 
"just  to  get  its  mouth  shut.  O  Mother,  is  n't  it  an  old 
dear?" 

Stub  Hollow  had  looked  upon  the  new  arrivals  at 
Aunt  Jed's  as  summer  people  until  they  began  to  fre- 
quent Stub  Hollow's  first  and  only  Presbyterian  church. 


284     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Natalie,  who  like  all  people  of  charm,  was  many  years 
younger  inside  than  she  was  out,  immediately  perceived 
that  the  introduction  of  mammy  in  her  best  Sunday 
turban  into  that  congregation  would  do  a  great  deal 
toward  destroying  its  comatose  atmosphere.  Like  many 
another  New  England  village  church,  Stub  Hollow's 
needed  a  jar  and  needed  it  badly.  But  it  was  n't  the 
church  that  got  the  jar. 

Upon  the  introduction  of  Gip  into  the  family  circle, 
it  was  conceded  that  there  was  no  longer  any  reason  why 
mammy  should  resign  the  benefits  of  communal  worship. 
Consequently,  with  many  a  grunt, — for  good  food  and 
better  air  had  well  nigh  doubled  her  proportions, — 
mammy  climbed  from  the  veranda  to  the  back  seat  of 
the  cart  and  filled  it.  For  a  moment  it  seemed  doubt- 
ful whether  mammy  or  Gip  would  hold  the  ground, 
but  Gip  finally  won  out  by  clawing  rapidly  at  the  peb- 
bly road  and  getting  the  advantage  of  the  down  grade. 

Neither  Natalie  nor  Mrs.  Leighton  ever  knew  just 
where  it  was  they  lost  mammy,  but  it  could  n't  have 
been  far  from  the  gate;  for  just  as  they  were  dipping 
into  the  wood  half-way  down  the  hill,  Mrs.  Leighton 
happened  to  glance  back,  missed  mammy,  and  saw  her 
stocky  form  waddling  across  the  lawn  toward  the  back 
of  the  house.  Mrs.  Leighton  was  also  young  inside.  She 
said  nothing. 

When  finally  they  drew  up,  with  the  assistance  of 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     285 

three  broad-shouldered  swains,  at  the  church,  Natalie 
looked  back  and  gasped, 

"Mammy!     Mother,  where  's  mammy?" 

"You  do  n't  suppose  she  could  have  got  off  to  pick 
flowers,  do  you  ?"  asked  Mrs.  Leighton,  softly. 

"Why,  Mother!"  cried  Natalie.  "Do  you  know  that 
mammy  may  be  killed?  We  '11  have  to  go  straight 
back." 

"No,  we  won't,"  said  Mrs.  Leighton,  flushing  at  her 
levity  before  the  very  portals  of  the  church.  "She  's  all 
right.  I  looked  back,  and  saw  her  crossing  the  lawn." 

"Even  so,"  said  Natalie,  severely,  "I  'm  surprised 
at  you"  Then  she  laughed. 

Church  seemed  very  long  that  day,  but  at  last  they 
were  out  in  the  sunshine  again  and  Gip  was  given  her 
full  head.  No  sooner  had  Zeke,  the  hired  man,  seized 
the  bit  than  Natalie  sprang  from  the  cart  and  rushed 
to  the  kitchen.  She  found  mammy  going  placidly  about 
her  business. 

"Doan'  yo'  talk  to  me,  chile,"  she  burst  out  at  sight 
of  Natalie.  "Doan'  yo'  dast  talk  to  me!" 

Natalie  threw  her  arms  about  her. 

"You  poor  mammy,"  she  murmured.  "Are  n't  you 
hurt?" 

"Hurt !"  snorted  mammy.  "Yo'  mammy  mought  'a' 
been  killed  ef  she  did  n'  carry  her  cushions  along  wif 
'er  pu'sson." 


CHAPTER   XLIII 

SIX  miles  away  from  Aunt  Jed's,  on  the  top  of  a  hill 
overlooking  the  Housatonic  Valley,  stood  the 
Leighton  homestead,  a  fine  old-fashioned  house,  now  un- 
occupied save  for  a  care-taking  farmer  and  his  wife, 
who  farmed  the  Leighton  acres  on  shares.  The  home- 
stead belonged  to  Lewis's  father,  and  in  the  natural 
course  of  events  was  destined  to  become  Lewis's  prop- 
erty. 

Great  was  the  excitement  at  Homestead  Farm  when 
a  telegram  arrived  announcing  the  imminent  arrival  of 
owner  and  son. 

"Land  sakes!  William,"  gasped  Mrs.  Tuck,  "in  two 
days!  You  '11  hev  to  send  'em  a  telegram  tellin'  'em 
it  can't  be  done  nohow.  I  told  you  my  conscience  was 
a-prickin?  me  over  the  spring  cleanin'.  Seems  like 
Providence  was  a-jostlin'  my  elbow  all  these  days,  and 
I  was  jest  too  ornery  to  pay  heed." 

"In  two  days,  it  says,"  repeated  William;  "and  we 
can't  send  no  telegram  because  there  ain't  no  address." 

Tuck  and  his  wife  had  no  children.  They  occupied 
the  kitchen  for  a  living-room  and  the  big  bedroom  over 
it  at  night.  The  main  part  of  the  house  was  shut  up. 

286 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     287 

The  hired  hands  occupied  rooms  in  the  barn  that  had 
once  been  the  quarters  of  a  numerous  stable  force,  for 
the  Leightons  had  always  gone  in  for  horses,  as  two 
or  three  long-standing  trotting  records  at  neighboring 
county  fairs  gave  evidence. 

Mrs.  Tuck  was  not  long  in  facing  the  inevitable. 
First  of  all  she  commandeered  all  the  labor  on  the 
farm ;  then  she  sent  a  call  for  aid  to  a  couple  of  neigh- 
bors. Within  an  hour  all  the  green  shutters  had  swung 
wide  on  their  creaking  hinges,  and  the  window-sashes 
were  up.  Out  of  the  open  windows  poured  some  dust 
and  a  great  deal  of  commotion.  Before  night  the  big 
house  was  spick  and  span  from  garret  to  cellar. 

"Does  seem  to  me,"  said  Mrs.  Tuck,  as  she  placed  a 
very  scrappy  supper  before  William,  "like  dust  is  as 
human  as  guinea  pigs.  Where  you  say  it  can't  get  in, 
it  jest  breeds." 

"Now  you  sit  down  and  take  it  easy,  Mrs.  Tuck," 
said  William,  who  had  married  late  in  life  and  never 
got  on  familiar  terms  with  his  wife.  "I  reckon  them 
men-folks  ain't  so  took  with  reddin'  up  as  you  think 
they  be." 

"Oh,  I  know,"  said  the  tired,  but  by  no  means  ex- 
hausted, Mrs.  Tuck,  "I  ain't  forgettin'  their  innards, 
ef  thet  's  what  you  're  thinkin'  of.  You  just  tell  Silas 
to  kill  four  broilers,  an'  I  '11  clean  'em  to-night.  Thet 
'11  give  me  a  start,  and  to-morow  I  c'n  do  a  few  dozen 


288     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

pies.  I  hev  got  some  mince-meat,  thank  goodness !  an' 
you  c'n  get  me  in  some  of  them  early  apples  in  the 
morning.  Seems  like  I  'm  not  going  to  sleep  a  wink 
for  thinkin'." 

Lewis  and  Leighton  did  not  motor  from  New  York 
to  the  Homestead  Farm,  as  ten  years  later  they  might 
have  done.  Motors,  while  common,  were  still  in  that 
stage  of  development  which  made  them  a  frequent 
source  of  revenue  to  the  farmer  with  a  stout  team  of 
horses.  Consequently  it  was  by  train  that  they  arrived 
at  Leighton's  home  station — a  station  that  had  grown 
out  of  all  recognition  since  last  he  had  seen  it. 

However,  he  himself  had  not  grown  out  of  recogni- 
tion. A  lank  figure  of  a  man,  red-cheeked,  white- 
bearded,  slouch-hatted,  and  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  stepped 
forward  and  held  out  a  horny  hand. 

"Well,  Glen,  how  be  ye?  Sure  am  glad  to  see  ye 
back." 

"Me,  too,"  said  Leighton,  grinning  and  flushing  with 
pleasure.  "Come  here,  Lew.  Shake  hands  with  Mr. 
Tuck." 

"Well,  I  swan!"  chuckled  William  as  he  crushed 
Lewis's  knuckles.  "Guess  you  do  n't  recollec'  ridin'  on 
my  knee,  young  feller  ?" 

"No,  I  do  n't,"  said  Lewis,  and  smiled  into  the  old 
man's  moist  blue  eyes. 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     289 

"And  who  be  this  ?"  asked  William,  turning  toward 
Helton. 

"That  ?    Oh,  that  's  Nelton,"  said  Lewis. 

"Glad  to  meet  ye,  Mr.  Eelton.  Put  it  thar!"  said 
William,  holding  out  a  vast  hand. 

For  an  instant  ISTelton  paused,  then,  with  set  teeth 
and  the  air  of  one  who  comes  to  grips  with  an  electric 
battery,  he  laid  his  fingers  in  Mr.  Tuck's  grasp. 
"Huh!"  remarked  William,  "ye  ain't  got  much  grip. 
Wait  tell  we  've  stuffed  ye  with  buttermilk  'n'  pies  'n' 
victuals  'n'  things." 

Nelton  said  not  a  word,-  but  cast  an  agonized  look 
at  Leighton,  who  came  to  his  aid. 

"Now,  William,  what  have  you  brought  down  ?" 

"Well,  Glen,  there  's  me  an'  the  kerryall  for  the 
folks,  an'  Silas  here  with  the  spring-wagon  for  the 
trunks." 

"Good,"  said  Leighton.  "Here,  Silas,  take  these 
checks  and  look  after  Mr.  Nelton.  Lew  and  I  will  go 
in  the  carryall." 

"Fancy  your  governor  a-pullin'  of  my  leg!"  mur- 
mured Nelton,  presumably  to  Lewis,  but  apparently  to 
space.  "Why  do  n't  'e  tell  this  old  josser  as  I  'm  a 
menial,  and  be  done  with  it." 

Old  William  started,  stared  at  Nelton,  then  at  Leigh- 
ton.  He  walked  off  toward  the  carryall,  scratching  his 
head. 


290     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"What  is  it?"  lie  asked  Lewis,  in  a  loud  whisper. 

"That  's  dad's  valet,"  said  Lewis,  grinning. 

"Valley,  is  it?"  said  William,  glancing  over  one 
shoulder.  "Nice,  lush  bit  o'  green,  to  look  at  him. 
What  does  he  do?" 

"Looks  after  dad.  Waits  on  him,  helps  him  dress, 
and  packs  his  bags  for  him." 

William  stopped  in  his  tracks  and  turned  on  Leigh- 
ton. 

"Glen,"  he  said,  "I  do  n't  know  ez  you  c'n  stand  to 
ride  in  the  old  kerryall.  I  ain't  brought  no  sofy  pil- 
lows, ner  even  a  fire-screen  to  keep  the  sun  from  sp'ilin' 
yer  complexion." 

Leighton  smiled,  but  said  nothing.  They  had  reached 
the  carryall,  an  old  hickory  structure  sadly  in  need 
of  paint.  Hitched  to  it  were  two  rangy  bays.  The 
harness  was  a  piece  of  ingenious  patchwork,  fitted  with 
hames  instead  of  collars.  Leighton  stepped  into  the 
back  seat,  and  Lewis  followed.  William  unhitched  the 
horses  and  climbed  into  the  cramped  front  seat.  When 
he  had  settled  down,  his  knees  seemed  to  be  peering  over 
the  dash-board.  "Gid  ap!"  he  cried,  and  the  bays 
started  off  slowly  across  the  bridge. 

The  road  to  the  homestead  followed  down  the  river 
for  three  miles  before  it  took  to  the  hills.  No  sooner 
had  the  carryall  made  the  turn  into  the  River  Road 
than  the  bays  sprang  forward  so  suddenly  that  Lewis's 


THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS     291 

hat  flew  off  backward,  and  for  a  moment  he  thought  his 
head  had  followed. 

"Heh !"  he  called,  "I  've  lost  my  hat !" 

"Never  mind  your  hat,  Son,"  shouted  William. 
"Silas  '11  pick  it  up." 

The  bays  evidently  thought  he  was  shouting  at  them. 
They  let  their  enormous  stride  out  another  link.  The 
carryall  plowed  through  the  dust,  rattled  over  pebbles, 
and,  where  the  road  ran  damp  under  overhanging  trees, 
shot  four  streams  of  mud  from  its  flying  wheels.  Old 
William  chewed  steadily  at  the  cud  of  tobacco  he  had 
kept  tucked  in  his  cheek  during  the  interview  at  the 
station.  His  long  arms  were  stretched  full  length  along 
the  taut  reins.  If  he  had  only  had  hand-holds  on  them, 
he  would  have  been  quite  content.  As  it  was,  he  was 
grinning. 

"Gee,  Dad !"  gasped  Lewis,  "d'  you  know  those  horses 
are  still  trotting!" 

Leighton  leaned  forward. 

"Got  a  match,  William  ?"  he  shouted  above  the  creak 
and  rattle  of  the  carryall. 

"Heh?"  yelled  William. 

The  bays  let  out  another  link. 

"Got  a  match?"  repeated  Leighton.  "I  want  to 
smoke." 

William  waved  his  beard  at  his  left-hand  pocket. 


292     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

As  they  struck  a  bit  of  quiet,  soft  road,  Leighton 
called : 

"Why  do  n't  you  let  'em  out  ?  You  've  gone  and  left 
your  whip  at  home.  How  are  we  going  to  get  up  the 
hill?" 

The  grin  faded  from  Old  William's  face.  "Gid  ap!" 
he  roared,  and  then  the  bays  showed  what  they  could 
really  do  in  the  way  of  hurrying  for  the  doctor.  The 
old  carryall  leaped  a  thank-you-ma'am  clean.  When  it 
struck,  the  hickory  wheels  bent  to  the  storm,  but  did  not 
break.  Instead,  they  shot  their  load  into  the  air.  A 
low-hanging  branch  swooped  down  and  swept  the  can- 
opy, supports  and  all,  off  the  carryall.  William  never 
looked  back. 

Lewis  clung  to  the  back  of  the  front  seat. 

"D-d-dad,"  he  stuttered,  "p-please  do  n't  say  anything 
more  to  him!  D-d'  you  know  they  're  still  trotting?" 

At  last  the  bays  swung  off  upon  the  steep  Hill  Road, 
and  slowed  down  to  a  fast,  pulling  walk.  Old  William 
dropped  the  reins  on  the  dash-board,  made  a  telling 
shot  with  tobacco  juice  at  a  sunflower  three  yards  off, 
and  turned  to  have  a  chat. 

"Glen,"  he  said,  "I  reckon,  after  all,  there  's  times 
when  you  c'n  do  without  sofy  pillows." 

"Why,  William,"  said  Leighton,  still  pale  with  fright, 
"If  I  'd  had  a  pillow,  I  'd  have  gone  fast  asleep."  Then 
he  smiled.  "Some  of  the  old  stock?" 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     293 

William  nodded. 

"I  do  n't  mind  tellin'  you  I  ain't  drove  like  thet  sence 

the  day  me  'n  you " 

,     "Never  mind  since  when,  William,"  broke  in  Leigh- 
ton,  sharply.    "How  's  Mrs.  Tuck  ?" 


CHAPTEE    XLIV 

IS  that  the  house ?"  asked  Lewis,  as  they  mounted  the 
brow  of  the  hill. 

Leighton  nodded. 

Across  a  wide  expanse  of  green  that  was  hardly- 
smooth  enough  to  be  called  a  lawn  gleamed  the  stately 
homestead.  It  was  of  deep-red  brick,  trimmed  with 
white.  It  stood  amid  a  grove  of  giant  sugar-maples. 
The  maples  blended  with  the  green  shutters  of  the  house, 
and  made  it  seem  part  and  parcel  of  the  grove.  Upon 
its  front  no  veranda  had  dared  encroach,  but  at  one  side 
could  be  seen  a  vine-covered  stoop  that  might  have  been 
called  a  veranda  had  it  not  been  dwarfed  to  insignifi- 
cance by  the  size  of  the  house.  The  front  door,  which 
alone  in  that  country-side  boasted  two  leaves,  was  wide 
open,  and  on  the  steps  leading  up  to  it,  resplendent  in 
fresh  gingham,  stood  Mrs.  Tuck. 

With  some  difficulty  William  persuaded  the  bays  to 
turn  into  the  long-unused  drive  that  swept  up  to  the 
front  door.  Leighton  sprang  out. 

"Hallo,  Mrs.  Tuck!"  he  cried.    "How  are  you?" 

"How  do  you  do  ?  I  'm  very  pleased  to  see  you  back, 
294 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     295 

Mr.  Leighton,"  said  Mrs.  Tuck,  who  read  the  best  ten- 
cent  literature  and  could  talk  "real  perlite"  for  five 
minutes  at  a  stretch.  "Come  right  along  in.  You  '11 
find  all  the  rooms  redded  up — I  mean " 

"Yes,  yes,"  laughed  Leighton,  "I  know  what  you 
mean  all  right.  I  have  n't  even  forgotten  the  smell 
of  hot  mince  pies.  Lew,  do  n't  you  notice  a  sort  of 
culinary  incense ' 

"Land  sakes!  them  pies  is  a-burnin  !"  shrieked  Mrs. 
Tuck  as  she  turned  and  ran. 

William  offered  to  show  the  way  to  the  bedrooms, 
but  Leighton  refused. 

"No,"  he  said,  "we  '11  come  around  and  help  you 
put  up  the  team.  No  use  washing  up  till  we  get  our 
things." 

Silas,  with  the  spring-wagon,  duly  appeared.  On  top 
of  the  baggage,  legs  in  air,  was  the  discarded  canopy  of 
the  carryall.  Beside  Silas  sat  Nelton.  He  was 
trembling  all  over.  In  his  lap  he  held  Lewis's  hat.  His 
bulging  eyes  were  fastened  on  it. 

"There  they  be,"  grunted  Silas.  "Told  you  they  was 
all  right.  William  be  a  keerful  driver." 

Nelton  raised  his  eyes  slowly.    They  lit,  with  wonder. 

"Mr.  Leighton,"  he  cried,  "Master  Lewis,  are  you 
safe  ?' 

"Quite  safe,  Nelton,"  said  Leighton.     "Why?" 


296     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Nelton  mutely  held  out  Lew's  hat  and  jerked  his  head 
back  at  the  wrecked  canopy. 

"Oh,  yes,"  said  Leighton,  nodding;  "we  dropped 
those.  Thank  you  for  picking  them  up.  Take  the 
bags  up-stairs." 

"Lew,"  said  Leighton,  as  they  were  washing,  "did  you 
use  to  have  dinner  at  night  at  Nadir  or  supper  ?" 

"Supper,"  said  Lewis. 

"Well,"  said  Leighton,  "that  's  what  you  '11  get  to- 
day— at  six  o'clock,  and  do  n't  you  be  frightened  when 
you  see  it.  It  has  been  said  of  the  Scotch  that  the  most 
wonderful  thing  about  them  is  that  they  can  live  on 
oats.  The  mystery  of  the  brawn  and  muscle  of  New 
England  is  no  less  wrapped  up  in  pies.  But  do  n't 
hesitate.  Pitch  in.  There  's  something  about  this  air 
that  turns  a  nightly  mixture  of  mince-pies,  pumpkin- 
pies,  custard-pies,  lemon-pies,  and  apple-pies,  with 
cheese,  into  a  substance  as  heavenly  light  as  fresh-fallen 
manna.  It  is  a  tradition,  wisely  fostered  by  the  farm- 
ers, that  the  only  thing  that  can  bring  nightmare  and 
the  colic  to  a  stomach  in  New  England  are  green  apples 
and  stolen  melons." 

Lewis  was  in  good  appetite,  as  was  Leighton.  They 
ate  heartily  of  many  things  besides  pies,  went  to  bed 
at  nine,  and  would  have  slept  the  round  of  the  clock 
had  not  a  great  gong — a  bit  of  steel  rail  hung  on  a 
wire — and  all  the  multitudinous  noises  of  farm  head- 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     297 

quarters  broken  out  in  one  simultaneous  chorus  at  half- 
past  five  in  a  glorious  morning. 

Noisy  geese  and  noisier  cocks,  whinnying  horses  and 
lowing  cattle,  the  rattle  of  milk-tins,  the  squeak  of  the 
well-boom,  the  clank  of  mowing-machines,  the  swish  of 
a  passing  brush-harrow,  and,  finally,  the  clamoring  gong, 
were  too  much  for  Nelton,  Lewis,  on  his  way  to  look 
for  a  bath,  caught  him  stuffing  what  he  called  "cotton 
an'  wool"  into  his  ears. 

"Tork  about  the  streets  of  Lunnon,  Master  Lewis," 
he  said.  "I  calls  this  country  life  deafemri." 

Lewis  had  wanted  to  telegraph  to  Natalie,  but  Leigh- 
ton  had  stopped  him. 

"You  've  waited  too  long  for  that,"  he  had  said. 
"You  have  apparently  neglected  Natalie  and  Mrs. 
Leighton.  When  people  think  they  've  been  neglected, 
never  give  them  a  chance  to  think  up  what  they  're 
going  to  say  to  you.  Just  fall  on  them." 

As  soon  as  they  had  breakfasted,  Leighton  took  Lewis 
to  the  top  of  the  hill  at  the  back  of  the  homestead.  It 
was  a  high  hill.  It  commanded  a  long  stretch  of  the 
Bousatonic  Valley  to  the  east,  and  toward  the  west  and 
north  it  overlooked  two  ridges,  with  the  dips  between, 
before  the  eye  came  up  against  the  barrier  of  the  Berk- 
shire range. 

Lewis  drew  a  long  breath  of  the  cold,  morning  air. 

"It  's  beautiful,  Dad,"  he  said. 


298     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Beautiful!"  repeated  Leighton,  his  eyes  sweeping 
slowly  and  wistfully  across  the  scene.  "Boy,  God  has 
made  no  lovelier  land." 

Then  he  turned  to  the  west  and  pointed  across  to  the 
second  ridge.  "Do  you  see  that  gleam  of  white  that 
stands  quite  alone?" 

"Yes,  I  think  I  see  what  you  mean,"  said  Lewis. 
"  'Way  down,  just  below  it,  you  can  see  the  tip  of  a 
church  steeple." 

"So  you  can,"  said  Leighton.  "Well,  that  gleam  of 
white  is  Aunt  Jed's.  Make  for  it.  That  's  where  you 
'11  find  Natalie." 

"Is  it?"  said  Lewis,  straightening,  and  with  a  flush 
of  excitement  in  his  cheeks.  "Are  n't  you  coming,  too  ?" 

"No,"  said  Leighton;  "not  to-day.  We  won't  ex- 
pect you  back  before  supper.  Tell  Mrs.  Leighton  that 
I  '11  be  over  soon  to  see  her  and  thank  her." 

Lewis  started  off  with  an  eager  stride,  only  to  learn 
that  Aunt  Jed's  was  farther  away  than  it  looked.  He 
found  a  road  and  followed  it  through  the  valley  and  up 
the  first  ridge,  then  seeing  that  the  road  meandered 
off  to  the  right  into  a  village,  he  struck  off  across  the 
fields  straight  for  the  distant  house. 

He  had  passed  through  the  moist  bottoms  and  come 
upon  a  tract  of  rock-strewn  pasture  land  when  he  saw 
before  him  the  figure  of  a  girl.  Her  back  was  to  him. 
A  great,  rough  straw  hat  hid  her  head.  She  wore  a 


THKOUGH    STAINED   GLASS     299 

white  blouSe  and  a  close-fitting  blue  skirt.  She  was 
tall  and  supple,  hut  she  walked  slowly,  with  her  eyes 
on  the  ground.  In  one  hand  she  carried  a  little  tin  pail. 

Lewis  came  up  behind  her. 

"What  are  you  looking  for  ?"  he  asked. 

The  girl  started  and  turned.  Lewis  stepped  forward. 
They  stood  and  stared  at  each  other.  The  little  tin  pail 
slipped  from  the  girl's  hand. 

"Strawberries,"  she  stammered.  "I  was  looking  for 
strawberries."  Then  she  added  so  low  that  he  scarcely 
heard  her,  "Lew  ?" 

"Nat!"  cried  Lewis.     "It  is  Nat!" 

Natalie  swayed  toward  him.  He  caught  her  by  the 
arms.  She  looked  at  him  and  tried  to  smile,  but  in- 
stead she  crumpled  into  a  heap  on  a  rock  and  cried — 
cried  as  though  her  heart  would  break. 

Lewis  sat  down  beside  her  and  put  one  arm  around 
her. 

"Why,  Nat,  are  n't  you  glad  to  see  me  ?  Nat,  do  n't 
cry!  Are  n't  you  glad  I  've  come?" 

Natalie  nodded  her  head  hard,  but  did  not  try  to 
speak.  Not  till  she  had  quite  finished  crying  did  she 
look  up.  Then  her  tear-stained  face  broke  into  a  radi- 
ant smile. 

"That 's — that  's  why  I  'm  crying,"  she  gasped ;  "be- 
cause I  'm  so  glad." 

So  there  they  sat  together  and  talked  about  what? 


About  strawberries.  Lewis  said  that  he  had  walked 
miles  across  the  fields,  and  seen  heaps  of  blossoms  but 
no  berries.  He  did  n't  think  the  wild  ones  had  berries. 
Which,  Natalie  said,  Was  nonsense.  Of  course  they  had 
berries,  only  it  was  too  early.  She  had  found  three 
that  were  pinkish.  She  pointed  to  them  where  they 
had  rolled  from  the  little  tin  pail.  Lewis  picked  one 
up  and  examined  it. 

"You  're  right,"  he  said  gravely,  "it 's  a  strawberry." 

Then  silence  fell  upon  them — a  long  silence,  and  at 
the  end  Lewis  said: 

"Nat,  do  you  remember  at  Nadir  the  guavas — when, 
you  7d  come  out  to  where  I  was  with  the  goats  ?" 

Natalie  nodded,  a  starry  look  in  her  far-away  eyes. 

"Nat,"  said  Lew,  "tell  me  about  it — about  Nadir — 
about — about  everything.  About  how  you  went  back 
to  Consolation  Cottage." 

Natalie  flashed  a  look  at  him. 

"How  did  you  know  we  had  been  back  to  Consolation 
Cottage  ?" 

"Why,  I  went  there,"  said  Lewis.  "It  is  n't  three 
months  since  I  went  there." 

"Did  you,  Lew  ?"  said  Natalie,  her  face  brightening. 
"Did  you  go  just  to  look  for  us  ?" 

"Of  course,"  said  Lewis.    "Now  tell  me." 

"No,"  said  Natalie,  with  a  shake  of  her  head,  "you 
first." 


CHAPTER   XLV 

IN  the  innocence  of  that  first  hour  Lewis  told  Natalie 
all.  He  even  told  her  of  Folly,  as  though  Folly, 
like  all  else,  was  something  they  could  share  between 
them.  Natalie  did  not  wince.  There  are  blows  that 
just  sting — the  sharp,  quick  blows  that  make  us  cry 
out,  and  then  wonder  why  we  cried,  so  quickly  does  the 
pain  pass.  They  are  nothing  beside  the  blows  that 
slowly  fall  and  crush  and  keep  their  pain  back  till  the 
overwhelming  last. 

People  wonder  at  the  cruel  punishment  a  battered 
man  can  take  and  never  cry  out,  at  the  calm  that  fills  the 
moment  of  life  after  the  mortal  wound,  and  at  the 
steady,  quiet  gaze  of  big  game  stricken  unto  death. 
They  do  not  know  that  when  the  blood  of  man  or  beast 
is  up,  when  the  heart  thunders  fast  in  conflict  or  in 
the  chase,  there  is  no  pain.  A  man  can  get  so  excited 
over  some  trifle  that  a  bullet  will  plow  through  his 
flesh  without  his  noticing  it.  Pain  comes  afterward. 
Pain  is  always  an  awakening. 

Natalie  was  excited  at  the  sudden  presence  of  Lew 
and  at  the  wonder  of  his  tale.  In  that  galaxy  of  words 
that  painted  to  her  a  climbing  fairy  movement  of  growth 

301 


302     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

and  achievement  the  single  fact  of  Folly  shot  through 
her  and  away,  but  the  wound  stayed.  For  the  moment 
she  did  not  know  that  she  was  stricken,  nor  did  Lewis 
guess.  And  so  it  happened  that  that  whole  day  passed 
like  a  flash  of  happy  light. 

Natalie,  in  her  wisdom,  had  gone  ahead  to.  warn  Mrs. 
Leighton  and  mammy  of  Lewis's  coming.  Even  so, 
when  the  two  women  took  him  into  their  long  embrace, 
he  knew  by  the  throbbing  of  their  hearts  how  deeply 
joy  can  shake  foundations  that  have  stood  firm  against 
the  heaviest  shocks  of  grief. 

Gip  and  the  cart,  with  Natalie  at  the  helm,  whisked 
Lewis  back  to  the  homestead.  What  memories  of  gal- 
loping ponies  and  a  far,  wide  world  that  ride  awakened 
they  did  not  speak  in  words,  but  the  light  that  was  in 
their  faces  when  at  the  homestead  gate  they  said  good 
night  was  the  light  that  shines  for  children  walking 
hand  in  hand  in  the  morning  land  of  faith. 

Natalie  could  not  eat  that  night.  She  slipped  away 
early  to  bed — to  the  little,  old-fashioned  bed  that  had 
been  Aunt  Jed's.  It,  too,  was  a  four-poster;  but  so 
pompous  a  name  overweighted  its  daintiness.  So  light 
were  its  trimmings  in  white,  so  snowy  the  mounds  of 
its  pillows  and  the  narrow1  reach  of  its  counterpane, 
that  it  seemed  more  like  a  nesting-place  for  untainted 
dreams  than  the  sensible;  stocky  little  bed  it  was. 

Natalie  went  to  bed  and  to  sleep,  but  scarcely  had 


THROUGH   STAINED   GLASS     303 

the  last  gleam  faded  from  the  western  sky  when  she 
awoke.  A  sudden  terror  seized  her.  The  pillow  be- 
neath her  cheek  was  wet.  Upon  her  heart  a  great 
weight  pressed  down  and  down.  For  a  moment  she 
rebelled.  She  had  gone  to  sleep  in  the  lap  of  her  hap- 
piest day.  How  could  she  wake  to  grief?  A  single 
word  tapped  at  her  brain :  Folly,  Folly.  And  then  she 
knew — she  knew  the  wound  her  happy  day  had 'left; 
and  wide-eyed,  fighting  for  breath,  her  arms  out- 
stretched, she  felt  the  slow  birth  of  the  pain  that  lives 
and  lives  and  grows  with  life. 

Natalie  cried  easily  for  happiness,  and  so  the  tears 
that  she  could  spare  to  grief  were  few.  Not  for  nothing 
had  she  been  born  to  the  note  of  joy.  Through  all  her 
life,  so  troubled,  so  thinly  spread  with  pleasures,  she 
had  clung  to  her  inheritance.  Often  had  her  mind  ques- 
tioned her  heart:  "What  is  there  in  this  empty  day? 
Why  do  you  laugh  ?  Why  do  you  sing  ?"  And  ever  her 
heart  had  answered,  "I  laugh  and  sing  because,  if  not 
to-day,  then  to-morrow,  the  full  day  cometh." 

But  to-night  her  inheritance  seemed  a  little  and  a 
cruel  thing.  Wide-eyed  she  prayed  for  the  tears  that 
would  not  come.  Dry  were  her  eyes,  dry  was  her  throat, 
and  dry  the  pressing  weight  upon  her  heart.  Hours 
passed,  and  then  she  put  forth  her  strength.  She  slipped 
from  the  bed  and  walked  with  groping  hands  toward 
the  open  window.  In  the  semi-darkness  she  moved  like 


304     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

a  tall,  pale  light.  Down  her  back  and  across  her  bosom 
her  hair  fell  like  a  caressing  shadow.  Her  white  feet 
made  no  sound. 

She  reached  the  window  and  knelt,  her  arms  folded 
upon  the  low  sill.  She  tossed  the  hair  from  before 
her  face  and  looked  out  upon  the  still  night.  How  far 
were  the  stars  to-night — as  cold  and  far  as  on  that  night 
of  long  ago  when  she  had  stood  on  the  top  of  the  highest 
hill  and  called  to  the  desert  for  Lew! 

She  stayed  at  the  window  for  a  long  time,  and  found 
meager  comfort  at  last  in  the  thought  that  Lewis  could 
not  have  guessed.  How  could  he  have  guessed  what  she 
herself  had  not  known?  She  arose  and  went  back  to 
bed.  Then  she  lay  thinking  and  planning  a  course 
that  should  keep  not  only  Lewis  but  also  Mrs.  Leigh- 
ton  and  mammy  blind  to  the  wound  she  bore.  And 
while  she  was  in  the  midst  of  planning,  sleep  came  and 
made  good  its  ancient  right  to  lock  hands  with  tired 
youth. 

Leighton  was  crestfallen -to  see  in  what  high  spirits 
Lew  had  come  back  from  his  first  day  with  Natalie. 
He  lost  faith  at  once  in  Helene's  cure.  Then,  as  they 
went  to  bed,  he  clutched  at  a  straw. 

"Lew,"  he  asked,  "did  you  tell  your  pal  everything  ?" 

"Everything  I  could  think  of  in  the  time,"  said 
Lewis,  smiling.  "One  day  is  n't  much  when  you  've 


got  half  of  two  lives  to  go  over.  Of  course  there  were 
things  we  forgot.  We  '11  have  them  to  tell  to-morrow." 

"Was  Folly  one  of  the  things  you  forgot  ?" 

"No,"  answered  Lewis  and  paused,  a  puzzled  look 
on  his  brow1.  He  was  wondering  why  he  had  remein- 
hered  Folly.  To-night  she  seemed  very  far  away.  Then 
he  threw  back  his  head  and  looked  at  his  father.  "Why 
did  you  ask  that?" 

Leighton  did  not  answer  for  a  moment.  Finally  he 
said: 

"Because  it  's  the  one  thing  you  had  n't  a  right  to 
keep  to  yourself.  I  'm  glad  you  saw  that.  Always 
start  square  with  a  woman.  If  you  do, — afterward, — 
she  '11  forgive  you  anything." 

Lewis  went  to  bed  with  the  puzzled  look  still  on  his 
face.  It  was  not  because  he  had  seen  anything  that 
he  had  told  of  Folly.  He  had  told  of  her  simply  as  a 
part  of  chronology — something  that  could  n't  be  skipped 
without  leaving  a  gap.  Now  he  wondered,  if  he  had  had 
time  to  think,  would  he  have  told?  He  had  scarcely 
put  the  question  to  himself  when  sleep  blotted  out 
thought. 

On  the  next  day  Leighton  had  the  bays  hitched  to 
what  was  left  of  the  carryall,  and  with  Silas  and  Lewis 
drove  over  to  Aunt  Jed's  to  pay  his  respects  to  Mrs. 
Leighton.  Natalie  and  Lew  went  off  for  a  ramble  in 
the  hills.  Mammy  bustled  about  her  kitchen  dreaming 


306     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

out  a  dream  of  an  early  dinner  for  the  company,  and 
murmuring  instructions  to  Ephy,  a  pale  little  slip  of  a 
woman  whom  the  household,  seeking  to  help,  had  in- 
stalled as  helper.  Mrs.  Leighton  stayed  with  Leighton 
out  under  the  elms.  They  talked  little,  but  they  said 
much. 

It  was  still  early  in  the  day  when  Leighton  said: 

"I  shall  call  you  Ann.    You  must  call  me  Glen." 

"Of  course,"  answered  Mrs.  Leighton,  and  then  won- 
dered why  it  was  "of  course."  "I  suppose,"  she  said 
aloud,  "it 's  'of  course'  because  of  Lew.  I  feel  as  though 
I  were  sitting  here  years  ahead,  talking  to  Lew  when  his 
head  will  be  turning  gray." 

"Do  n't !"  cried  Leighton.  "Do  n't  say  that !  Lew 
travels  a  different  road." 

Mrs.  Leighton  looked  up,  surprised  at  his  tone. 

"Perhaps  you  do  n't  see  what  we  can  see.  Perhaps 
you  do  n't  know  what  you  have  done  for  Lew." 

"I  have  done  nothing  for  Lew,"  said  Leighton,  quick- 
ly. "If  anything  has  been  done  for  Lew,  it  was  done 
in  the  years  when  I  was  far  from  him  in  body,  in  mind, 
and  in  spirit.  Lew  would  have  been  himself  without 
me.  It  is  doubtful  whether  he  would  have  been  him- 
self without  you.  I — I  do  n't  forget  that." 


CHAPTEE  XLVI 

AT  four  o'clock  Leighton  sent  for  Silas. 
"Take  the  team  home,  Silas/'  he  said.     "We 
're  going  to  walk.     Come  along,  Lew." 

"It  's  awfully  early,  Dad,"  said  Lew,  with  a  protest- 
ing glance  at  the  high  sun. 

"The  next  to  the  last  thing  a  man  learns  in  social 
finesse,"  said  Leighton,  "and  the  very  last  rule  that 
reaches  the  brain  of  woman,  is  to  say  good-by  while  it 
's  still  a  shock  to  one's  hosts." 

"And  it  's  still  a  shock  to-day,"  said  Mrs.  Leighton, 
smiling.  "But  you  must  n't  quarrel  with  what  your 
father  's  said,  Lew,"  she  added.  "He  's  given  you  the 
key  to  the  heart  of  'Come  again !' ' 

"As  if  Lew  would  ever  need  that !"  cried  Natalie. 

Soon  after  leaving  the  house,  Leighton  struck  off  to 
the  right  and  up.  His  step  was  not  springy.  His  head 
hung  low  on  his  breast,  and  his  fingers  gripped  ner- 
vously at  the  light  stick  he  carried.  He  did  not  speak, 
and  Lewis  knew  enough  not  to  break  that  silence.  They 
crossed  a  field,  Leighton  walking  slightly  ahead.  HJe 
did  not  have  to  look  up  to  lead  the  way. 

307 


308     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

Presently  they  came  into  a  lane.  It  dipped  off  to  the 
left,  into  the  valley.  It  was  bordered  by  low,  gray 
stone  walls.  On  its  right  hung  a  thick  wood  of  sec- 
ond-growth trees — a  New  England  wood,  various  beyond 
the  variety  of  any  other  forest  on  earth.  It  breathed  a 
mingled  essence  of  faint  odors.  The  fronds  of  the  trees 
reached  over  and  embowered  the  lane. 

On  the  left  the  view  was  open  to  the  valley  by  reason 
of  a  pasture.  The  low  stone  wall  was  topped  by  a  snaky 
fence  of  split  rails.  They  were  so  old,  so  gray,  that 
they,  too,  seemed  of  stone.  Beyond  them  sloped  the 
meager  pasture-land ;  brown,  almost  barren  even  in  the 
youth  of  the  year.  It  was  strewn  with  flat,  outcropping 
rocks.  Here  and  there  rose  a  mighty  oak.  A  splotch 
of  green  marked  a  spring.  Below  the  spring  one  saw 
the  pale  blush  of  laurel  in  early  June. 

Leighton  stopped  and  prodded  the  road  with  his  stick. 
Lewis  looked  down.  He  saw  that  his  father's  hand  was 
trembling.  His  eyes  wandered  to  a  big  stone  that 
peeped  from  the  loam  in  the  very  track  of  any  passing- 
wheel.  The  stone  was  covered  with  moss — old  moss. 
It  was  a  long  time  since  wheels  had  passed  that  way. 

Leighton  walked  on  a  few  steps,  and  then  paused 
again,  his  eyes  fixed  on  a  spot  at  the  right  of  the  lane 
where  the  old  wall  had  tumbled  and  brought  with  it  a 
tangled  mass  of  fox-grape  vine.  He  left  the  roadway 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     309 

and  sat  on  the  lower  wall,  his  back  against  a  rail.  He 
motioned  to  Lewis  to  sit  down  too. 

"I  have  brought  you  here/'  said  Leighton  and 
stopped.  His  voice  had  been  so  low  that  Lewis  had  un- 
derstood not  a  word.  "I  have  brought  you  here,"  said 
Leighton  again,  and  this  time  clearly,  "to  tell  you  about 
your  mother." 

Lewis  restrained  himself  from  looking  at  his  father's 
face. 

"Your  mother's  name,"  went  on  Leighton,  "was 
Jeanette  O'Reilly.  She  was  a  milk-maid.  That  is, 
she  did  n't  have  to  milk  the  cows,  but  she  took  charge 
of  the  milk  when  it  came  into  the  creamery  and  did  to 
and  with  it  all  the  things  that  women  do  with  milk.  I 
only  knew  your  mother  when  she  was  seventeen.  No 
one  seemed  to  know  where  Jeanette  came  from.  Per- 
haps Aunt  Jed  knew.  I  think  she  did,  but  she  never 
told.  I  never  asked.  To  me  Jeanette  came  straight 
from  the  hand  of  God. 

"I  have  known  many  beautiful  women,  but  since 
Jeanette,  the  beauty  of  women  has  not  spoken  to  the 
soul  of  me.  There  is  a  beauty — and  it  was  hers — that 
cries  out,  just  as  a  still  and  glorious  morning  cries  out, 
to  the  open  windows  of  the  soul.  To  me  Jeanette  was 
all  sighing,  sobbing  beauty.  Beauty  did  not  rest  upon 
her;  it  glowed  through  her.  She  alone  was  the  prism 


: 


310     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

through  which  my  eyes  could  look  upon  the  Promised 
Land.  I  knew  it,  and  so — I  told  my  father. 

"I  was  only  a  boy,  not  yet  of  age.  My  father  never 
hesitated.  All  the  power  that  law  and  tradition  al- 
lowed he  brought  to  bear.  He  forbade  me  to  visit  Aunt 
Jed's  or  to  see  Jeanette  again.  He  gave  me  to  under- 
stand that  the  years  held  no  hope  for  me — that  on  the 
day  I  broke  his  command  I  would  cut  myself  off  from 
him  and  home.  To  clinch  things,  he  sent  me  away  to 
college  a  month  early,  and  put  me  under  a  tutor. 

"There  is  a  love  that  forgets  all  else — that  forgets 
honor.  I  forged  a  letter  to  the  authorities  and  signed 
my  father's  name  to  it.  It  told  them  to  send  me  back 
at  once — that  my  mother  was  ill.  I  came  back  to  these 
hills,  but  not  home.  Far  back  in  the  woods  here  Wil- 
liam Tuck  had  a  hut.  He  was  a  wood-cutter.  He  lived 
alone.  He  owed  nothing  to  any  man.  Many  a  time 
we  had  shot  and  fished  together.  I  came  back  to  Wil- 
liam. 

"This  lane  does  n't  lead  to  Aunt  Jed's.  This  land 
never  belonged  to  her.  Here  we  used  to  meet,  Jeanette 
and  I.  You  see  the  mass  of  fox-grape  over  yonder? 
In  that  day  the  wall  had  n't  tumbled.  It  stood  straight 
and  firm.  The  fox-grape  sprang  from  it  and  climbed 
in  a  great  veil  over  the  young  trees.  Behind  that  wall, 
in  the  cool  dusk  of  the  grapevine,  we  used  to  sit  and 
laugh  inside  when  a  rare  buggy  or  a  wagon  went  by." 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     311 

Leighton  drew  a  long  breath. 

"I  used  to  lie  with  my  head  in  Jeanette's  lap  be- 
cause it  was  the  only  way  I  could  see  her  eyes.  Her 
lashes  were  so  long  that  when  she  raised  them  it  was 
like  the  slow  flutter  of  the  wings  of  a  butterfly  at  rest. 
She  did  not  raise  them  often.  She  kept  them  down — 
almost  against  the  soft  round  of  her  cheek — because — 
because,  she  said,  she  could  dream  better  that  way. 

"How  shall  I  tell  you  about  her  hair?  I  used  to 
reach  up  and  pull  at  it  until  it  tumbled.  And  then,  be- 
cause Jeanette's  hair  never  laughed  except  when  it  was 
the  playmate  of  light,  I  used  to  drag  her  to  her  feet, 
across  the  wall,  across  the  lane,  down  there  to  the  flat 
rock  just  above  the  spring. 

"There  we  would  sit,  side  by  side,  and  every  once  in 
a  while  look  fearfully  around,  so  public  seemed  that 
open  space.  But  all  we  ever  saw  for  our  pains  was  a 
squirrel  or  perhaps  a  woodchuck  looking  around  fear- 
fully, too.  Jeanette  would  sit  with  her  hands  braced 
behind  her,  her  tumbled  hair  splashing  down  over  her 
shoulders  and  down  her  back.  The  setting  sun  would 
come  skipping  over  the  hills  and  play  in  her  hair,  and 
Jeanette's  hair  would  laugh — laugh  out  loud.  And  I 
— I  would  bury  my  face  in  it,  as  you  bury  your  face  in 
flowers,  and  wonder  at  the  unshed  tears  that  smarted  in 
my  eyes." 

Leighton  stopped  to  sigh.     It  was  a  quivering  sigh 


312     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

that  made  Lewis  want  to  put  out  his  hand  and  touch 
his  father,  but  he  was  afraid  to  move.  Leighton  went 
on. 

-  "Look  well  about  you,  boy.  No  wheel  has  jarred  this 
silence  for  many  a  year — >not  since  I  bought  the  land 
you  see  and  closed  the  road  Man  seldom  comes  here 
now, — only  children  in  the  fall  of  the  year  when  the 
chestnuts  are  ripe.  Jeanette  liked  children.  She  was 
never  anything  but  a  child  herself.  Look  well  about 
you,  I  say,  for  these  still  woods  and  fields,  with  God's 
free  air  blowing  over  them, — they  were  your  cradle,  the 
cradle  of  your  being. 

"It  was  Jeanette  that  made  me  go  back  to  college 
when  college  opened,  but  months  later  it  was  William 
that  sent  for  me  when  Jeanette  was  too  weak  to  stop 
him.  The  term  was  almost  over.  Through  all  the  win- 
ter I  had  never  mentioned  Jeanette  to  the  folks  at  home, 
hoping  that  my  father  would  let  me  come  home  for  the 
summer  and  wander  these  hills  unwatched.  Now  Wil- 
liam wrote.  I  could  n't  make  out  each  individual  word, 
but  the  sum  of  what  he  tried  to  tell  flew  to  my  heart. 

"Jeanette  had  disappeared  from  Aunt  Jed's  three 
months  before.  They  had  not  found  her,  for  they  had 
watched  for  her  only  where  I  was.  She  had  gone  to 
William's  little  house.  She  had  been  hidden  away  there. 
While  she  was  well  enough,  she  had  not  let  him  send 
for  me.  There  was  panic  in  William's  letter,  for  he 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     313 

wrote  that  he  would  meet  the  first  train  by  which  I 
could  come,  and  every  other  train  thereafter. 

"You  heard  William  say  the  other  day  that  he  had 

*/  «/ 

never  driven  like  that  since — and  there  I  stopped  him. 
It  was  since  the  day  I  came  back  to  Jeanette  he  was 
going  to  say.  We  did  n't  mind  the  horses  breaking 
that  day.  Where  the  going  was  good,  they  ran  because 
they  felt  like  it ;  where  it  was  bad,  they  ran  because  I 
made  them.  I  asked  William  if  he  had  a  doctor,  and 
he  said  he  had.  He  had  done  more  than  that:  he  had 
married  Mrs.  Tuck  to  look  after  Jeanette. 

"We  stopped  in  the  village  for  the  parson.  I  was 
going  to  blurt  out  the  truth  to  him,  but  William  was 
wiser.  He  told  him  that  some  one  was  dying.  So  we 
got  the  old  man  between  us,  and  I  drove  while  William 
held  him.  He  would  have  jumped  out.  He  thought  we 
were  mad." 


CHAPTER   XLVII 

LEIGHTON  paused  as  he  thought  grimly  over  that 
ride.  Then  he  went  on: 

"The  last  thing  my  father  paid  for  out  of  his  own 
pocket  on  my  account  was  that  team  of  horses  from 
the  livery  stable.  They  got  to  William's  all  right,  but 
they  were  broken — broken  past  repair.  Poor  beasts! 
Even  so  we  were  only  just  in  time.  The  old  parson 
married  me  to  Jeanette.  I  would  have  killed  him  if  he 
had  hesitated.  I  did  n't  have  to  tell  him  so ;  he  saw  it. 

"For  one  blessed  moment  Jeanette  forgot  pain  and 
locked  her  arms  about  my  neck.  Then  they  pushed  me 
out,  and  William  and  the  parson  with  me.  Mrs.  Tuck 
and  the  doctor  stayed  in  there.  You  were  born."  Leigh- 
ton  gripped  his  hands  hard  on  his  stick.  "What — what 
was  it  the  old  woman — the  fortune-teller — said?" 

"  'Child  of  love  art  thou,'  "  repeated  Lewis,  in  a  voice 
lower  than  his  father's.  "  'At  thy  birth  was  thy  mother 
rent  asunder,  for  thou  wert  conceived  too  near  the 
heart.'  " 

Leighton  trembled  as  though  with  the  ague.  He 
nodded  his  head,  already  low  sunk  upon  his  breast. 

"It  was  that — just  that,"  he  whispered.  "They 

314 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     315 

called  us  in,  the  old  preacher  and  me.  Jeanette  stayed 
just  for  a  moment,  her  hand  in  mine,  her  eyes  in  mine, 
and  then — she  was  gone.  The  old  parson  cried  like  a 
child.  I  wondered  why  he  cried.  Suddenly  I  knew, 
and  my  curses  rose  above  his  prayers.  I  sprang  for 
William's  rifle  in  the  corner,  and  before  they  could  stop 
me,  I  shot  you. 

"Boy,  I  shot  to  kill;  but  the  best  shot  at  a  hundred 
yards  will  miss  every  time  at  a  hundred  inches.  The 
bullet  just  grazed  your  shoulder,  and  at  the  sting  of  it 
you  began  to  gasp  and  presently  to  cry.  Years  after- 
ward the  doctor  told  me  you  would  never  have  lived  to 
draw  a  single  breath  if  it  had  n't  been  for  that  shot. 
The  shock  of  it  was  what  started  your  heart,  your  lungs. 
They  had  tried  slapping,  and  it  had  n't  done  any  good." 

Leighton  paused  again  before  he  went  on  in  a  dull 
voice. 

"After  that  I  can  tell  you  what  happened  only  from 
hearsay.  Aunt  Jed  came  and  took  you  and  what  was 
left  of  Jeanette,  your  mother.  Sometime  you  must  stop 
in  the  churchyard  down  yonder  under  the  steeple  and 
look  for  a  little  slab  that  tells  nothing — nothing  except 
that  Jeanette  died  a  wife  before  the  law  and — and 
much  beloved  before  God. 

"They  kept  me  at  William's  for  days  until  I  was 
in  my  right  mind.  The  day  they  took  me  home  was 
the  day  father  paid  for  the  horses — the  day  he  died. 


316     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASSi 

I  do  n't  know  if  he  would  have  forgiven  me  if  he  had 
lived.  I  never  saw  him  again  alive,  after  he  knew. 
I  've  often  wondered.  I  would  give  a  lot  to  know, 
even  to-day,  that  he  would  have  forgiven.  But  life  is 
like  that.  Death  strikes  and  leaves  us  blind — blind  to 
some  vital  spring  of  love,  could  we  but  find  it  and 
touch  it." 

Lewis  was  young.  Just  to  hear  the  burden  that  had 
lain  so  long  upon  his  father's  heart  was  too  much  for 
him.  ]STot  for  nothing  had  Leighton  lived  beside  his 
boy.  There,  under  the  still  trees,  their  souls  reached 
out  and  touched.  Lewis  dropped  his  head  and  arms 
upon  his  father's  knees  and  sobbed.  He  felt  as  though 
his  whole  heart  was  welling  up  in  tears. 

Leighton's  hand  fell  caressingly  upon  him.  He  did 
not  speak  until  his  boy  had  finished  crying,  then  he 
said: 

"I  've  told  you  all  this  because  you  alone  in  all  the 
world  have  a  right  to  know,  a  right  to  know  your  full 
inheritance — the  inheritance  of  a  child  of  love." 

Leighton  paused. 

"I  never  saw  you  again,"  he  went  on,  "until  that  day 
when  we  met  down  there  at  the  ends  of  the  earth.  Aunt 
Jed  had  sent  you  down  there  to  hide  you  from  me. 
Before  she  died  she  told  me  where  you  were  and  sent 
me  to  you.  She  need  n't  have  told  me  to  go  after  you. 

"As  you  go  on  and  meet  a  wider  world,  you  will  hear 


THEOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS    317 

strange  things  of  your  father.  Believe  them  all,  and 
then,  if  you  can,  still  remember.  Do  n't  waste  love. 
That  's  a  prayer  and  a  charge.  I  've  wasted  a  lot  of 
life  and  self,  but  never  a  jot  of  love.  Now  go,  boy. 
Tell  them  I  've  stayed  behind  for  supper." 

Lewis  did  not  hurry.  When  he  reached  the  home- 
stead, it  was  already  late.  Mrs.  Tuck  had  kept  their 
supper  hot  for  them.  When  she  saw  Lewis  come  in 
alone,  she  rushed  up  to  him  with  eager  questions  of  his 
father.  Lewis  looked  with  new  eyes  upon  her  kindly 
anxious  face. 

"It  's  all  right,"  he  said.  "Dad  stayed  behind.  He 
does  n't  want  any  supper." 

Mrs.  Tuck  looked  shrewdly  at  him,  and  then  turned 
away. 

"It  ain't  never  all  right,"  she  said  half  to  herself, 
"when  a  man  full-grown  do  n't  want  his  supper." 

Lewis  saw  nothing  more  of  his  father  that  night. 
He  tried  to  keep  awake,  but  it  was  long  after  sleep  had 
conquered  him  that  Leighton  came  in.  And  during  the 
days  that  followed  he  saw  less  and  less  of  his  father. 
Early  in  the  morning  Leighton  would  be  up.  He  would 
eat,  and  then  wander  about  the  place  listlessly  with  his 
cigar.  His  head  hanging,  he  would  wander  farther  and 
farther  from  the  house  until,  almost  without  volition, 
he  would  suddenly  strike  off  in  a  straight  line  across 
the  hills. 


318     THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Lewis  would  have  noticed  the  desertion  more  had  it 
not  been  for  Natalie.  Natalie  claimed  and  held  all  his 
days.  Together  they  walked  and  drove  till  Lewis  had 
learned  all  the  highways  and  byways  that  Natalie  had 
long  since  discovered.  She  liked  the  byways  best,  and 
twice  she  drove  through  crowding  brush  to  the  foot  of 
the  lane  that  was  barred. 

"I  've  often  come  here,"  she  said,  "and  I  've  even 
tried  to  pull  those  bars  down,  but  they  're  solider  than 
they  look.  I  'm  not  strong  enough.  Will  you  help  me 
some  day?  I  want  to  follow  that  dear  old  mossy  lane 
to  its  end,  if  it  has  one.  It  looks  as  if  it  led  straight 
into  the  land  of  dreams." 

"It  probably  does,"  said  Lewis.  "I  '11  never  help 
you  pull  down  those  bars,  because,  if  you  've  got  any 
heart,  you  can  look  at  them  and  see  that  whoever  put 
them  up  owns  that  land  of  dreams,  and  there  's  no  land 
of  dreams  with  room  for  more  than  two  people,  and  they 
must  be  holding  hands." 

"You  've  made  me  not  want  to  go  in  there,"  said 
Natalie  as  she  turned  Gip  around.  "How  could  you  see 
it  like  that  ?  You  're  not  a  woman." 

Lewis  did  not  answer,  but  when,  two  days  later,  they 
were  out  after  strawberries,  and  Natalie  led  him 
through  a  wood  in  the  valley  to  the  foot  of  the  pasture 
with  the  oaks  and  the  spring,  Lewis  stopped  her. 

"Do  n't  let  's  go  up  there,  Nan,"  he  said.    "That  's 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS    319 

part  of  somebody  else's  land  of  dreams.    Dad  's  up  there 
somewhere,  I  'm  sure." 

Natalie  looked  at  him,  and  he  saw  in  her  eyes  that 
she  knew  all  that  he  had  not  told  in  words. 


CHAPTEE    XLVIII 

LEIGHTON  and  Lewis  made  two  business  trips 
away  from  the  homestead,  and  on  both  occa- 
sions, as  soon  as  affairs  permitted,  hurried  back  with 
equal  eagerness.  Leighton  tried  to  read  significance 
into  the  fact  that  Lewis  was  not  chafing  at  his  absence 
from  Folly,  but  he  could  not  because  Lewis  wrote  to 
Folly  every  week,  and  seemed  to  revel  in  telling  her 
everything.  Folly's  answers  were  few  and  far  between. 

Leighton  would  have  given  much  to  see  one  of  Folly's 
letters.  He  wondered  if  her  maid  wrote  them  for  her. 
He  used  to  watch  Lewis  reading  them.  They  were  in- 
variably short — mere  notes.  Lewis  would  read  each  one 
several  times  to  make  it  seem  like  a  letter.  He  seemed 
to  feel  that  his  father  would  like  to  see  one  of  the 
letters,  and  one  day,  to  keep  himself  from  calling  him- 
self coward,  he  impulsively  handed  one  over. 

Leighton  read  the  scant  three  pages  slowly.  It  was 
as  though  Folly  had  reached  across  the  sea  to  scratch 
him  again,  for  the  note  was  well  written  in  a  bold, 
round  hand.  It  was  short  because  Folly  combined  the 
wisdom  of  the  serpent  with  the  voice  of  a  dove.  She 
knew  the  limits  of  her  shibboleth  of  culture,  and  never 

320 


THROUGH    STAINED   GLASS    321 

passed  them.  She  said  only  the  things  she  had  learned 
to  write  correctly.  They  were  few. 

The  few  weeks  at  the  homestead  had  changed  Leigh- 
ton.  A  single  mood  held  him — a  mood  that  he  never 
threw  off  with  a  toss  of  his  head.  He  seemed  to  have 
lost  his  philosophy  of  cheerfulness  at  the  word  of  com- 
mand. Lewis  was  too  absorbed  in  his  long  days  with 
Natalie  to  notice  it,  but  Nelton  took  it  upon  himself 
to  open  his  eyes. 

"Larst  month,"  he  said,  "you  and  the  governor  was 
brothers.  Now  persons  do  n't  have  to  ask  me  is  he  your 
father.  It 's  written  in  his  fyce.  It 's  this  country  life 
as  has  done  it.  Noisy,  I  calls  it.  No  rest." 

Lewis  felt  penitent.  He  suggested  to  Leighton  a  day 
together,  a  tramp  and  a  picnic,  but  Leighton  shook  his 
head. 

"I  do  n't  want  to  have  to  talk,"  he  said  bluntly. 

"Dad,"  said  Lewis,  "let 's  go  away." 

Leighton  started  as  though  the  words  were  something 
he  had  too  long  waited  for. 

"Go  away?"  he  repeated.  How  often  had  he  said, 
"To  go  away  is  the  sovereign  cure."  "Yes,"  he  went 
on,  "I  believe  you  are  right.  I  think  it  's  high  time — 
past  time — for  me  to  clear.  Will  you  come  or  stay?" 

"I  '11  come  if  it  's  London,"  said  Lewis,  smiling. 

"London   first,   of  course,"  said  Leighton,  gravely. 


322     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"To-day  is  Tuesday.  Say  we  start  on  Thursday.  That 
gives  us  a  day  to  go  over  and  say  good-by." 

"One  day  is  n't  enough,"  said  Lewis.    "Make  it  two." 

"All  right,"  agreed  Leighton. 

For  that  afternoon  Lewis  and  Natalie  had  planned  a 
long  tramp,  but  before  they  had  gone  a  mile  from  Aunt 
Jed's  a  purling  brook  in  the  depths  of  a  still  wood 
raised  before  them  an  impassable  barrier  of  beauty.  By 
a  common,  unspoken  consent  they  sat  down  beside  the 
gurgling  water.  They  talked  much  and  were  silent 
much. 

For  the  first  time  Lewis  had  something  in  mind  which 
he  was  afraid  to  tell  to  Natalie.  He  was  not  afraid 
for  her.  It  was  a  selfish  fear.  He  was  afraid  for  him- 
self— afraid  to  tell  her  that  two  short  days  would  close 
the  door  for  them  on  childhood.  He  wondered  that 
mere  years  had  been  powerless  to  close  that  door.  He 
looked  on  Natalie,  and  knew  that  renunciation  would  be 
hard. 

Natalie  had  tossed  aside  her  hat.  She  sat  leaning 
against  the  crisp  trunk  of  a  silver  birch.  Her  hands 
were  in  her  lap.  Her  dress  was  crumpled  up,  display- 
ing her  crossed  feet  and  the  tantalizing  line  of  her  slim 
ankles.  Against  the  copper  green  of  the  tree  trunk  the 
mass  of  her  hair  was  pressed,  gold  upon  the  shadow  of 
gold.  Her  moist  lips  were  half  open.  Her  eyes  were 
away,  playing  with  memory. 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     323 

"Bet  you  can't  tell  me  the  first  thing  you  ever  said 
to  me,"  said  Lewis. 

"My  dwess  is  wumpled,"  said  Natalie,  promptly,  a 
single  dimple  coming  and  going  with  her  sudden  smile. 
Then  she  looked  down  and  blushed.  She  straightened 
out  her  skirt,  and  patted  it  in  place.  They  looked  at 
each  other  and  laughed. 

"Do  you  remember  what  came  after  that?"  said 
Lewis,  teasingly.  "We  kissed  each  other." 

Natalie  nodded. 

"Nat,"  said  Lewis,  "do  you  remember  any  kiss  after 
that  one?" 

"No,"  said  Natalie. 

"Funny,"  said  Lewis.  "I  do  n't  either.  Do  you  want, 
me  to  kiss  you  when  it  comes  to  saying  good-by  ?" 

Natalie  turned  a  wide  and  questioning  look  on  him. 

"No,"  she  said  in  a  tone  he  had  never  heard  from  her 
before. 

Lewis  sank  back  upon  one  elbow.  He  had  been  on 
the  point  of  telling  her  that  good-by  was  only  two  days 
off.  Her  tone  stopped  him.  "Do  you  remember  the 
night  of  the  sunset?"  he  asked,  instead. 

Natalie  nodded. 

"I  said  I  was  going  to  sail  to  the  biggest  island.  You 
said  you  were,  too,  and  I  said  you  could  n't  because 
you  were  littlest.  Do  you  remember?" 

Natalie  sank  her  head  slowly  in  assent.     Her  lower 


324     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

lip  trembled.     Suddenly  she  laughed  and  sprang  to  her 
feet. 

"Come  on,"  she  cried,  "or  we  '11  be  late  for  supper. 
I  '11  beat  you  to  the  fence."  She  was  off  with  a  rush, 
but  Lewis  got  to  the  fence  first.  He  helped  her  over 
with  mock  ceremony.  When  they  came  to  a  wall  farther 
on  he  helped  her  over  again.  This  helping  Natalie  over 
obstacles  was  something  new.  It  gave  him  faint  twinges 
of  pleasure. 

They  came  to  the  foot  of  the  pasture  at  the  back 
of  the  house  and  to  the  last  wall  of  all.  "Come  on," 
said  Lewis,  smiling  and  holding  out  his  hand. 

"Not  this  time,  silly,"  said  Natalie.  "Do  n't  you  see 
the  bars  are  down  ?" 

"Yes,  I  see,"  said  Lewis,  springing  into  the  open 
gap  in  the  wall,  "but  you  're  not  coming  through  here. 
You  're  going  over." 

"Am  I  ?"  said  Natalie,  and  rushed  at  him. 
With  one  arm  he  caught  her  around  the  waist  and 
threw  her  back.  She  landed  on  all  fours,  like  a  cat. 
Then,  laughing,  she  sprang  up  and  came  at  him  again, 
only  to  be  hurled  back  once  more.  Lewis  was  laughing, 
too,  laughing  at  this  last  romp  in  the  name  of  child- 
hood. Natalie  was  so  strong,  so  supple,  that  he  handled 
her  roughly  without  fear  of  hurting  her.  They  both 
felt  the  joy  of  strength  and  battle  and  exulted.  Four 
times  Natalie  stormed  the  breach,  and  four  times  was 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     325 

she  hurled  back.  Then  she  stood,  panting,  and  holding 
her  sides,  the  blood  rioting  in  her  cheeks,  and  fire  in 
her  eyes. 

"Give  up  ?"  asked  Lewis. 

Natalie  shook  her  head. 

"We  '11  be  late  for  supper." 

"I  do  n't  care,"  said  Natalie.  "I  '11  never  give  up ; 
only  I  'm  cold."  She  shivered. 

"Cold,  Nat  ?"  cried  Lewis.  "Here."  He  started  to 
take  off  his  thick  tweed  coat.  At  the  exact  moment 
when  his  arms  were  imprisoned  in  the  sleeves,  Natalie 
shot  by  him.  She  held  her  skirts  above  her  knees  and 
ran. 

Long  was  the  chase  before  Lewis  caught  her.  He 
threw  his  arms  around  her  and  held  her.  Natalie  did 
not  struggle. 

"You  can't  carry  me  back,"  she  gasped.  "It  's  too 
far."  Then  suddenly  from  her  eyes  a  woman  looked 
out — a  woman  Lewis  did  not  know.  His  arms  dropped 
to  his  sides.  He  felt  the  blood  pumping  in  his  heart — 
his  heart  that  had  been  pressed  but  now  against  the 
breast  of  this  strange  unknown.  By  one  impulse  they 
turned  from  each  other  and  walked  silently  to  the  house. 
They  were  strangers. 


CHAPTEK   XLIX 

THAT  evening  when  Natalie  was  driving  him  home 
Lewis  told  her  that  to-morrow  was  good-by.  Gip, 
as  usual,  was  holding  Natalie's  attention  so  that  she 
could  scarcely  pay  heed  to  what  Lewis  was  saying.  But 
the  central  fact  that  he  and  Leighton  were  going  hung 
in  her  mind  and  sank  in  slowly,  so  that  when  they  got 
to  the  homestead  she  could  say  quite  evenly: 

"Shall  we  see  you  again  ?" 

"Of  course,"  said  Lewis,  "Dad  and  I  will  come  over 
to  say  good-by." 

"Come  for  supper,"  said  Natalie.  "I  won't  be  home 
in  the  morning.  Good  night." 

Lewis  walked  slowly  to  the  house.  Natalie  had  not 
given  him  time  to  ask  why  she  would  not  be  at  home 
in  the  morning.  He  grudged  giving  that  morning  to 
any  foreign  interest.  He  wondered  what  he  could  do 
to  kill  all  that  time  alone. 

The  next  afternoon  he  and  Leighton  drove  over  to 
Aunt  Jed's  in  state.  Leighton  was  still  held  by  his 
mood — a  mood  that  was  not  morose  so  much  as  distant. 
Lewis  himself  was  in  no  good  humor.  The  morning 
had  palled  on  him  even  more  than  he  had  feared.  Now 

326 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    32Y 

he  felt  himself  chilled  when  he  longed  to  be  warmed. 
Where  his  spirit  cried  out  for  sunshine,  his  father's 
mood  threw  only  shadow.  How  tangible  and  real  a 
thing  was  that  shadow  he  never  realized  until  they 
reached  Aunt  Jed's  and  found  that  it  had  got  there 
before  them. 

Despite  mammy's  art,  the  supper  was  a  sad  affair. 
It  was  not  the  sadness  of  close-knitted  hearts  about  to 
part  that  seized  upon  the  company.  Love  can  thrive 
on  the  bitter-sweet  of  that  pain.  It  was  a  deeper  sad- 
ness— the  sadness  that  in  evil  hours  seizes  upon  the  in- 
dividual soul  and  says :  "You  stand  alone.  From  this 
desert  place  of  the  mind  you  can  flee  by  the  road  of 
any  trifling  distraction,  but  into  it  no  companion  ever 
enters.  You  stand  alone."  "I  myself,"  cries  the  soul 
of  man,  and  recoils  from  that  brink  of  infinite  distance. 
Such  was  the  mood  that  Leighton  had  imposed  on  those 
he  touched  that  day,  for,  while  he  could  take  no  com- 
pany into  his  desert  place,  by  simply  going  there  he 
could  drive  the  rest  each  to  his  far  wilderness. 

After  supper  they  sat  long  in  a  silence  without  com- 
munion. It  became  unbearable.  In  such  an  hour  bodily 
nearness  becomes  a  repulsion.  Lewis  rebelled.  He 
looked  indignantly  at  Natalie.  She  too  was  young. 
Why  did  not  her  youth  revolt?  But  Natalie  was  n't 
feeling  young  that  night.  She  did  not  answer  his  look. 


328     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"Dad,"  said  Lewis,  "I  think  we  'd  better  go.  We 
have  to  make  an  early  start." 

"All  right,"  said  Leighton,  listlessly.     "Tell  Silas." 

Lewis  rose  and  turned  to  Natalie. 

"Are  n't  you  coming?"  he  asked. 

Natalie  got  up  slowly,  and  drew  a  filmy  white  scarf 
— a  cloud,  she  called  it — about  her  shoulders.  There 
seemed  an  alien  chill  in  the  air. 

As  they  walked  toward  the  barn,  a  memory  that  had 
been  playing  hide-and-seek  with  Lewis's  mind  through- 
out the  evening  suddenly  met  him  full  in  the  face  of 
thought.  He  stopped  and  stared  at  Natalie.  She  was 
dressed  in  red.  What  was  it  they  had  called  that  birth- 
day dress  of  long  ago?  Accordion  silk.  The  breeze 
caught  Natalie's  skirt  and  played  with  it,  opening  out 
the  soft  pleats  and  closing  them  again.  The  breeze 
seized  upon  the  ends  of  the  cloud  and  lifted  them  fitfully 
as  though  they  were  wings  too  tired  for  full  flight. 

"Nat,"  whispered  Lewis,  "You  remember  the  night 
I  left  Nadir.  Is  it  the  same  dress  ?" 

"Silly,"  said  Natalie,  smiling  faintly.  "I  Ve  grown 
ten  inches  since  then." 

Lewis  reached  out  slowly  and  took  her  hands.  How 
he  remembered  that  good-by,  every  bit  of  it !  Natalie's 
hands  gripping  his  shoulders,  his  arms  about  her  twitch- 
ing, warm  body,  his  face  buried  in  her  fragrant  hair  I 
But  to-night  her  hands  were  cold  and  trembling  to  with- 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS     329 

drawal.  He  felt  withdrawal  in  her  whole  body,  so 
close  to  him,  so  far  away.  Why  was  she  so  far  away  ? 
Suddenly  he  remembered  yesterday — the  moment  when 
the  stranger  woman  had  looked  out  at  him  from  Na- 
talie's eyes.  She  was  far  away  because  they  two  had 
traveled  far  from  childhood. 

His  own  hands  were  hot.  They  were  eager  to  seize 
Natalie,  to  drag  himself  back,  and  her  with  him,  into 
childhood's  land  of  faith.  But  he  knew  he  had  not  the 
strength  for  that.  He  had  only  the  strength  to  drop 
her  cold  hands  and  to  turn  and  shout  for  Silas. 

On  the  way  home  Lewis  plunged  rebelliously  against 
his  father's  mood. 

"Dad,"  he  said,  "do  you  think  Natalie  belongs  to 
the  Old  Guard?" 

"The  Old  Guard  ?"  repeated  Leighton,  vacantly. 
Then  a  gleam  of  light  dawned  in  his  eyes.  "Your 
little  pal — (the  Old  Guard.  No,  she  does  n't  belong 
in  the  way  of  a  recruit;  she  has  n't  joined  the  ranks. 
Do  you  want  to  know  why  ?  Because,  boy,  your  little 
pal  and  women  like  her  are  the  foundation,  the  life's 
blood,  of  the  Old  Guard.  She  does  n't  have  to  join. 
She  is,  was,  and  always  will  be  the  Old  Guard  itself. 
In  her  single  heart  she  holds  the  seven  worlds  of 
women." 

"But,  Dad,"  said  Lewis,  half  turning  in  his  seat, 


330     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"you  do  n't  know  Natalie.  You  've  never  once  talked 
to  her." 

Leighton  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"I  Ve  met  lots  of  men  that  know  God;  I  've  never 
seen  one  that  could  prove  him.  I  know  Natalie  better 

— better "  Then  suddenly  his  mind  trailed  off  to 

its  desert  place.  He  would  speak  no  more  that  night. 

The  next  day  they  were  off.  Action  and  movement 
brought  a  measure  of  relief  from  the  very  start.  Leigh- 
ton  glanced  almost  eagerly  from  the  windows  of  the 
hurrying  train,  watching  for  the  sudden  turn  and  the 
new  view.  There  remained  in  his  eyes,  however,  a  des- 
perate question.  Was  "going  away"  still  the  sovereign 
cure? 

At  New  York  a  cable  awaited  him.  He  opened  it, 
read  it,  and  turned  bruskly  to  Lewis. 

"I  'm  not  going  to  London,"  he  said.  "I  'm  going 
to  Naples  direct.  Old  Ivory  will  wait  for  me  there. 
You  '11  be  going  to  London,  I  suppose." 

For  the  first  time  Lewis  felt  far  away  from  his  father. 
He  flushed.  LCe  felt  like  crying,  because  it  came  upon 
him  suddenly  that  he  was  far  away  from  his  father, 
that  they  had  been  traveling  different  roads  for  many 
days.  Pride  came  to  his  aid. 

"Yes,"  he  said,  steadily,  "I  shall  go  to  London." 

Leighton  nodded  and  turned  to  Nelton.  He  gave 
him  a  string  of  rapid  orders,  to  which  Nelton  answered 


THKOIJGH    STAINED    GLASS     331 

with  his  frequent  and  unfailing :  "Yes,  sir.  Thank  you, 
sir." 

"Wait  here,"  said  Leighton.  "I  'm  going  to  answer 
this." 

He  hurried  away,  and  Lewis,  feeling  unaccountably 
tired,  sat  down  on  a  divan.  ZSTelton  remained  on  guard 
beside  the  bags,  repulsing  the  attacks  of  too  anxious 
bell-boys.  To  him  came  a  large,  heavy-faced  person, 
pensively  plying  a  toothpick. 

"Say,  young  feller,"  he  said,  "how  much  do  you 
get?" 

Nelton  stared,  dumfounded,  at  the  stranger. 

"How  much  do  I  get?"  he  stammered. 

"Yep,  just  that,"  said  the  stranger.  "What  's  your 
pay?" 

Helton's  face  turned  a  brick  red.  He  glared  stead- 
ily into  the  stranger's  eyes,  but  said  nothing. 

"Well,  well,  never  mind  the  figure  if  you  're  ashamed 
of  it,"  said  the  stranger,  calmly.  "This  is  my  offer.  If 
you  '11  shake  your  boss  and  come  to  me,  I  '11  double 
your  pay  every  year  so  long  as  you  stick  to  that  'Yes, 
sir,  thank  you,  sir/  talk  and  manner.  What  do  you 
say?  Is  it  a  deal?" 

"What  do  I  s'y?"  repeated  Nelton,  licking  his  lips. 
Lewis,  grinning  on  the  lounge,  was  eavesdropping  with 
all  his  ears. 


332     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

"H — m — m,"  said  the  stranger,  "double  your  pay 
every  year  if  you  keep  it  up." 

"I  s'y  this,"  said  Nelton,  a  slight  tremble  in  his  voice, 
"I  Ve  been  serving  gentlemen  so  long  that  I  do  n't  think 
we  'd  hit  it  off  together,  thank  you." 

The  stranger's  shrewd  eyes  twinkled,  but  he  was 
otherwise  unmoved. 

"Perhaps  you  're  right,"  he  mumbled,  still  plying  his 
toothpick.  "Anyway,  I  'm  glad  you  're  not  a  worm." 
He  drew  a  large  business  card  from  his  pocket  and  held 
it  out.  "Come  to  me  if  you  ever  want  a  man's  job." 

Nelton  took  the  card  and  held  it  out  as  though  he 
had  been  petrified  in  the  act.  His  bulging  eyes  watched 
the  stranger  as  he  sauntered  leisurely  back  to  his  seat, 
then  they  turned  to  Lewis. 

"What  do  you  think  of  that  ?"  they  asked. 

Lewis  held  out  his  hand  for  the  card  and  glanced 
at  the  name. 

"Nelton,"  he  said,  "you  've  made  a  mistake.  Better 
go  over  and  tell  the  old  boy  you  've  reconsidered  his 
proposition.  I  '11  fix  it  up  with  dad.  You  '11  be  able 
to  retire  in  three  years." 

"Master  Lewis,"  said  Nelton,  gravely,  "there  's  lots 
of  people  besides  you  and  the  governor  that  thinks  we 
serving-men  says  'Yes,  sir,  thank  you,  sir,'  to  any  one 
for  the  syke  of  a  guinea  a  week  and  keep.  Now  you 
and  the  stout  party  eating  the  toothpick  over  yonder 
knows  better." 


CHAPTER   L 

O~N  the  following  day,  while  Leighton  and  Lewis 
were  sorting  out  their  things  and  Nelton  was 
packing,  Leighton  said: 

"Nelton,  you  'd  better  go  back  to  London  with  Mr. 
Lewis." 

"Beg  your  pardon,  sir,"  said  Nelton  from  the  depths 
of  a  trunk,  "but  I  'd  like  to  go  with  you,  sir." 

"Where  to?"  asked  Leighton,  surprised.     "Africa?" 

"Yes,  sir,  Africa,  sir." 

Leighton  paused  for  a  moment  before  he  said : 

"Nelton,  you  can't  go  to  Africa,  not  as  a  serving- 
man.  You  would  n't  be  useful  and  you  would  n't  be 
comfortable.  Africa  's  a  queer  place,  the  cradle  of 
slavery  and  the  land  of  the  free.  A  place,"  he  con- 
tinued, half  to  himself,  "where  masters  become  men. 
They  are  freed  from  their  servants  by  the  law  that  says 
white  shall  not  serve  white  while  the  black  looks  on 
lest  he  be  amazed  that  the  gods  should  wait  upon  each 
other." 

He  turned  back  to  Helton  and  added  with  a  smile 
that  was  kindly: 

333 


334     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

''What  would  you  do  in  a  land  where  just  to  be 
white  spells  kingship — a  kingship  held  by  the  power  to 
stand  up  to  your  thirty  miles  a  day,  to  bear  hunger  and 
thirst  without  whimpering,  to  stand  steady  in  danger, 
and  to  shoot  straight  and  keep  clean  always?  It  's  a 
land  where  all  the  whites  sit  down  to  the  same  table, 
but  it  is  n't  every  white  that  can  get  to  the  table.  You 
must  n't  think  I  'm  picking  on  you,  Nelton.  The  man 
that  's  going  with  me  is  always  hard  up,  but  I  heard 
him  refuse  an  offer  of  Lord  Dubbley's  of  all  expenses 
and  a  thousand  pounds  down  to  take  him  on  a  trip." 

"Lord  Dubbley!"  repeated  Nelton,  impressed.  "Is 
there  anything  w'at  a  lord  can't  'ave  ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Leighton.  "There  are  still  tables  you 
can't  sit  down  at  for  just  money  or  name,  but  they  are 
getting  further  and  further  away." 

"Mr.  Lewis  Leighton  and  servant"  attracted  consid- 
erable attention  on  the  Laurentia,  but  let  it  be  said 
to  Lewis's  credit,  or,  rather,  to  the  credit  of  his  abstrac- 
tion, that  he  did  not  notice  it.  Never  before  had  Lewis 
had  so  much  to  think  about.  His  parting  with  his 
father  ought  to  have  been  more  than  a  formality.  Why 
had  it  been  a  mere  incident — an  incident  scarcely  sa- 
lient among  the  happenings  of  a  busy  day?  As  he 
looked  back,  Lewis  began  to  see  that  it  was  not  yester- 
day or  the  day  before  that  he  had  parted  from  his 
father.  When  was  it,  then?  Suddenly  it  came  upon 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     335 

him  that  their  real  farewell  had  been  said  in  that  still, 
deserted  lane  overlooking  his  father's  land  of  dreams. 

The  realization  depressed  him.  He  did  not  know 
why.  He  did  not  know  that  the  physical  partings  in 
this  world  are  as  nothing  compared  with  those  divisions 
of  the  spirit  that  come  to  us  unawares,  that  are  never 
seen  in  anticipation,  but  are  known  all  too  poignantly 
when,  missing  from  beside  us  some  long  familiar  soul, 
we  look  back  and  see  the  parting  of  the  ways. 

Then  there  was  another  matter  that  had  come  to 
puzzle  his  inexperience.  He  knew  nothing  of  his 
father's  theory  that  there  is  no  erotic  affection  that  can 
stand  a  separation  of  six  months  in  conjunction  with 
six  thousand  miles.  To  youth  erotic  affection  is  non- 
existent ;  all  emotional  impulse  is  love.  Along  this  road 
the  race  would  have  come  to  utter  marital  disaster  long 
ago  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  youth  takes  in  a  new 
impulse  with  every  breath. 

In  certain  aspects  Lewis  had  the  maturity  of  his  age. 
People  who  looked  at  him  saw  a  man,  not  a  boy.  But 
there  was  a  shy  and  hidden  side  of  him  that  was  very 
young  indeed.  He  was  one  of  those  men  in  whom 
youth  is  inherent,  a  legion  that  cling  long  to  dreams 
and  "are  ever  ready  to  stand  and  fall  by  some  chosen 
illusion.  Reason  can  not  rob  them  of  God,  nor  women 
rob  them  of  woman. 

To  Lewis's  youth  had  come  a  new  impulse  so  en- 


336     THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

tangled  with  contact  with  Helene,  with  Leighton,  and 
with  Natalie  that  he  could  not  quite  define  it.  He  only 
knew  that  it  had  pushed  Folly  back  in  his  vision — so 
far  hack  that  his  mind  could  not  fasten  upon  and  hold 
her  in  the  place  to  which  he  had  given  her  a  right.  The 
realization  troubled  him.  He  worried  over  it,  but  com- 
forted himself  with  the  thought  that  once  his  eyes  could 
feast  again  upon  her  living  self,  she  would  blot  out,  as 
before,  all  else  in  life. 

He  should  have  arrived  in  London  on  Saturday  night, 
but  a  heavy  fog  held  the  steamer  to  the  open  sea  over 
night,  and  it  was  only  late  on  Sunday  morning  that 
he  disembarked  at  Plymouth.  Well  on  in  the  afternoon 
he  reached  town  and  rushed  to  the  flat  for  a  wash  and 
a  change  before  seeking  Folly. 

Eager  to  taste  the  pleasures  of  surprising  the  lady  of 
his  choice,  he  had  sent  her  no  word  of  his  coming,  and 
as  a  consequence  he  found  her  apartment  empty — 
empty  for  him,  for  Eolly  was  not  in.  Marie  opened 
the  door,  and  after  a  few  gasping  words  of  welcome  told 
him  that  Folly  had  just  gone  out,  that  she  was  driving 
in  the  park ;  but  would  n't  he  come  in  and  wait  ? 

At  first  he  said  "Yes,"  but  his  impatience  did  not 
let  him  even  cross  the  threshold.  It  drove  him  out  to 
the  park  with  the  assurance  that  it  was  better  to  hunt 
for  a  needle  in  a  haystack  than  to  sit  down  and  wait  for 
the  needle  to  crawl  out  to  him.  For  a  while  he  stood 


33Y 

at  a  point  of  vantage  and  watched  the  long  procession 
of  private  motor-cars  and  carriages,  but  he  watched  in 
vain.  Depressed,  he  started  to  walk,  and  his  mood 
carried  him  away  from  the  throng. 

He  was  walking  head  down  when  a  lonely  carriage 
standing  by  the  curb  drew  his  eye.  At  first  he  thought 
desire  had  deceived  his  senses.  The  equipage  looked 
very  like  Folly's  smart  little  victoria,  but  it  was  empty, 
and  the  man  on  the  box  was  a  stranger.  Lewis  ap- 
proached him  doubtfully.  "Is  this  Miss  Delaires's  car- 
riage ?"  he  asked. 

The  man  looked  him  over  before  he  answered: 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Where  is  Miss  Delaires?"  asked  Lewis,  his  face 
brightening. 

"Doin'  'er  mile,"  replied  the  coachman. 

Lewis  waved  his  hand  toward  a  path  to  the  right 
questioningly.  The  man  nodded.  Feeling  suddenly 
young  again,  Lewis  hurried  along  the  path  with  a  long 
and  eager  stride.  He  had  not  gone  far  when  he  saw  a 
dainty  figure,  grotesquely  accompanied  by  a  ragamuffin, 
coming  toward  him.  He  did  not  have  to  ask  himself 
twice  if  the  dainty  figure  was  Folly's.  If  he  had  been 
blind,  the  singing  of  the  blood  in  his  veins  would  have 
spelled  her  name. 

He  stepped  behind  a  screening  bush  and  waited  to 
spring  out  at  her.  His  eyes  fastened  curiously  upon 


the  ragamuffin.  He  could  see  that  he  was  speaking  to 
Folly,  and  that  she  was  paying  no  regard  to  him.  Pres- 
ently Lewis  could  hear  what  he  was  saying: 

"Aw,  naow,  lydy,  give  us  a  penny,  won't  cher?" 

"I  won't,"  replied  Folly,  sharply.  "I  said  I  would  n't, 
and  I  won't.  I  '11  give  you  up  to  the  first  officer  we 
come  to,  though,  if  you  do  n't  clear." 

"Ah,  ga-arn!"  said  the  youth,  whose  head  scarcely 
reached  to  Folly's  waist.  "Course  you  won't  give  me 
no  penny.  You  ain't  no  lydy." 

Folly  stopped  in  her  tracks.  Her  face  went  suddenly 
livid  with  rage. 

"No  lydy !"  she  cried  in  the  most  directly  expressive 
of  all  idioms.  "If  I  was  n't  a  perfect  lydy,  I  'd  slap 
your  blankety  blank  little  blank." 

At  each  word  of  the  virile  repartee  of  Cockneydom 
coming  so  incongruously  from  those  soft  lips,  Lewis's 
heart  went  down  and  down  in  big,  jolting  bumps. 
Scarcely  aware  of  what  he  was  doing,  he  stepped  out 
into  the  path.  Folly  looked  up  and  saw  him.  The  look 
of  amazement  in  his  face,  eyes  staring  and  mouth  open 
and  gulping,  struck  and  held  her  for  a  second  before 
she  realized  who  it  was  that  stood  before  her. 

For  just  the  fraction  of  a  moment  longer  she  was 
frightened  and  puzzled  by  Lewis's  dumfounded  mien; 
then  her  mind  harked  back  for  the  clue  and  got  it.  No 
one  had  to  tell  her  that  the  game  was  up  so  far  as  Lewis 


THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS     339 

was  concerned.  She  knew  it.  Her  face  suddenly 
crinkled  up  with  mirth.  With  a  peal  of  laughter,  she 
dodged  him  and  ran  improperly  for  her  very  proper 
little  turnout.  He  did  not  follow  except  with  his  eyes. 

"Larfin'  at  us,  governor,"  jibed  the  diminutive  cock- 
ney, putting  a  rail  between  himself  and  Lewis.  "The 
'uzzy!  The  minute  I  lays  my  heye  on  that  marm,  I 
says,  'Blime  yer,  you  ain't  no  lydy' !  I  say,  governor, 
give  us  a  penny." 

Lewis  turned  away  and  took  a  few  steps  gropingly, 
head  down,  as  though  he  walked  in  a  trance.  Pres- 
ently he  stopped  and  came  back,  feeling  with  finger  and 
thumb  in  his  waistcoat  pocket.  He  drew  out  a  gold  coin, 
looked  at  it  gravely,  and  flipped  it  across  the  rail  at  the 
ragamuffin.  Then  he  turned  and  walked  off  with  a 
rapid  stride. 

The  little  cockney  snatched  at  the  coin,  and  popped 
it  into  his  mouth.  Too  overwhelmed  to  speak  his  grati- 
tude, he  stood  on  his  head  until  Lewis  was  out  of  sight. 
It  was  the  first  time  in  his  life  that  he  had  handled, 
much  less  possessed,  a  "thick  un." 


CHAPTER   LI 

T  1 1HJU  expert  surgeon,  operating  for  blindness  on 
JL  the  membranes  of  the  eye,  is  denied  the  bulwark 
of  an  anesthetic.  Such  a  one  will  tell  you  that  the 
moment  of  success  is  the  moment  most  pregnant  with 
disaster.  To  the  patient  who  has  known  only  the  frac- 
tion of  life  that  lies  in  darkness,  the  sudden  coming  of 
light  is  a  miracle  beyond  mere  resurrection  from  the 
dead.  But  he  is  warned  he  must  avoid  any  spasm  of 
joy.  Should  he  cry  out  and  start  at  the  coming  of  the 
dawn,  in  that  moment  he  bids  farewell  forever  to  the 
light  of  day. 

Something  of  this  shock  of  sudden  sight  had  come  to 
Lewis,  but  it  came  to  him  with  no  spasm  of  joy.  A  man 
who  has  been  drugged  does  not  awake  to  joy,  but  to 
pain.  Liberation  and  suffering  too  often  walk  hand  in 
hand.  Lewis  had  felt  no  bondage;  consequently  his 
freedom  was  as  terrible  as  it  was  sudden.  It  plunged 
him  into  depths  of  depression  he  had  never  before 
sounded. 

From  the  park  he  went  mechanically  to  the  flat,  and 
sat  for  hours  by  the  window  looking  out  upon  the  dead 
Sunday  gray  of  London.  Darkness  came,  and  with  it 

340 


THROUGH   STAINED    GLASS     341 

Nelton  and  lights.  Nelton  remarked  that  there  was 
nothing  to  eat  in  the  house. 

"I  know,"  said  Lewis,  and  sat  on,  too  abject  to  dress 
and  go  out  for  dinner.  In  his  depression  his  thoughts 
turned  naturally  to  his  father.  He  thought  of  joining 
him,  and  searched  time-tables  and  sailings,  only  to  find 
that  he  could  not  catch  up  with  the  expedition.  Be- 
sides, as  he  looked  back  on  their  last  days  in  America, 
he  doubted  whether  his  father  would  have  welcomed 
his  coming. 

The  next  few  days  were  terrible  indeed,  for  Lady 
Deri,  as  he  had  feared,  was  out  of  town.  He  wrote  to 
her,  begging  her  to  let  him  know  where  she  was  and 
when  she  would  come  to  London.  For  three  days  he 
waited  for  an  answer,  and  then  the  emptiness  of  the 
whole  world,  the  despair  of  isolation,  drove  him  to  his 
studio  and  to  work. 

He  had  had  an  impulse  to  write  to  Natalie,  even  to 
go  to  her;  but  there  was  a  fineness  in  his  nature  that 
stopped  him,  a  shame  born  of  the  realization  of  his 
blindness  and  of  the  pity  in  which  Helene  and  Leigh- 
ton  and  perhaps  even  Natalie  must  have  held  him. 

Suddenly  the  full  import  of  Helene's  intimate  sacri- 
fice in  the  disrobing  of  the  palpitating  sorrow  of  her 
life  and  of  his  father's  immolation  of  his  land  of 
dreams  struck  him.  They  had  done  these  things  to  make 
him  see,  and  he  had  remained  blind.  They  had  struck 


342     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

the  golden  chords  of  the  paean  of  mighty  love,  and  he 
had  clung,  smiling  and  unhearing,  to  his  penny  whistle. 

For  the  first  time,  and  with  Folly  farther  away  than 
ever  before,  he  saw  her  as  she  was.  Once  he  had  thought 
that  she  and  youth  were  inseparable,  that  Folly  was 
youth.  Now,  in  the  power  of  sudden  vision,  he  saw 
as  his  father  had  seen  all  along,  that  Folly  was  as  old 
as  woman,  that  she  had  never  been  young. 

These  things  did  not  come  to  Lewis  in  a  single  day, 
but  in  long  hours  of  work  spread  over  many  weeks. 
Be  was  laboring  at  a  frieze,  a  commission  that  had 
come  to  him  through  Le  Brux,  and  upon  which  he  had 
done  considerable  work  before  going  to  America.  What 
he  had  done  had  not  been  altogether  pleasing  to  his 
father.  Lewis  had  felt  it,  though  Leighton  had  said 
little  beyond  damning  it  to  success. 

Now  Lewis  saw  the  beginning  he  had  made  through 
his  father's  eyes.  He  saw  the  facile  riot  and  exagger- 
ations of  youth,  and  contrasted  their  quick  appeal  to  a 
hurried  age  with  the  modesty  of  the  art  that  hides  be- 
hind the  vision  and  reveals  itself  not  to  an  age  or  to 
ages,  but  in  the  long,  slow  measure  of  life  everlasting. 
He  undid  all  but  the  skeleton  of  what  he  had  done, 
and  on  the  bare  frame  built  the  progression  of  repressed 
beauty  which  was  to  escape  the  glancing  eye  only  to 
find  a  long  abiding-place  in  the  hearts  of  those  who 
worship  seldom,  but  worship  long. 


THEOUGH   STAINED    GLASS     343 

At  last  he  got  word  from  Helene.  Has  letter  had 
followed  her  to  the  Continent  and  from  there  to  Egypt. 
She  wrote  that  she  was  tired  of  travel,  and  was  coming 
home.  In  a  postscript  she  mentioned  a  glimpse  of 
Leighton  at  Port  Said.  Lewis  was  impatient  to  see 
her.  He  had  begun  to  know  his  liberation. 

The  revelation  that  had  come  to  him  in  the  park  was 
not  destined  to  stand  alone.  Between  such  women  as 
Folly  and  their  victims  exists  an  almost  invariable 
camaraderie  that  forbids  the  spoiling  of  sport.  The 
inculcation  of  this  questionable  loyalty  is  considered 
by  some  the  last  attribute  of  the  finished  adventuress, 
and  by  others  it  is  said  to  be  due  to  the  fact  that  such 
women  draw  and  are  drawn  by  men  whose  major  rule  is 
to  "play  fair."  Both  conclusions  are  erroneous,  as  any 
victim  can  testify. 

The  news  that  Lewis  no  longer  followed  in  Folly's 
train  permeated  his  world  with  a  rapidity  that  has  no 
parallel  outside  of  London  except  in  the  mental  teleg- 
raphy of  aboriginal  Africa.  Men  soon  began  to  talk 
to  him,  to  tell  him  things.  He  turned  upon  the  first 
with  an  indignant  question,  "Why  did  n't  you  tell  me 
this  before  ?"  and  the  informer  stared  at  him  and 
smiled  until  Lewis  found  the  answer  for  himself  and 
flushed.  Ten  thousand  pointing  fingers  cannot  show 
the  sunrise  to  the  blind. 

By  the  time  Helene  came  back,  Lewis  not  only  knew 


344     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

his  liberation,  but  had  begun  to  bless  Folly  as  we 
bless  the  stroke  of  lightning  that  strikes  at  us  and  just 
misses.  He  complied  with  Helene' s  summons  promptly, 
but  with  a  deliberation  that  surprised  him,  for  it  was 
not  until  he  was  on  the  way  to  her  house  that  he  real- 
ized that  he  had  no  troubles  to  pour  out  to  her  ear. 

Nevertheless,  a  sense  of  peace  fell  upon  him  as  he 
entered  the  familiar  room  of  cheerful  blue  chintzes  and 
light.  Helene  was  as  he  had  ever  known  her.  She 
gave  him  a  slow,  measuring  welcome,  and  then  sat 
back  and  let  him  talk.  Woman's  judgment  may  err  in 
clinging  to  the  last  word,  but  never  is  her  finesse  at 
fault  in  ceding  the  first. 

Helene  heard  Lewis's  tale  from  start  to  finish  with 
only  one  interruption.  It  took  her  five  minutes  to  find 
out  just  what  it  was  Folly  had  said  in  her  own  tongue 
to  the  little  cockney  in  his,  and  even  at  that  there  were 
one  or  two  words  she  had  to  guess.  When  she  thought 
she  had  them  all,  she  sat  up  straight  and  laughed. 

Lewis  stared  at  her. 

"Do  you  think  it  's  funny  ?"  he  demanded. 

"Oh,  no,  of  course  not,"  gasped  Lady  Deri,  trying  to 
gulp  down  her  mirth.  "Not  at  all."  And  then  she 
laughed  again. 

Lewis  waited  solemnly  for  her  to  finish,  then  he  told 
her  of  some  of  the  things  he  had  heard  at  the  club. 

"Helene,"  he  finished,  "I  want  you  to  know  that  I 


THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS    345 

do  n't  only  see  what  a  fool  I  was.  I  see  more  than 
that.  I  see  what  you  and  dad  sacrificed  to  my  blind- 
ness. I  want  you  to  know  that  you  did  n't  do  it  in 
vain.  Six  months  ago,  if  I  had  found  Folly  out,  I 
would  have  gone  to  the  dogs,  taken  her  on  her  own 
terms,  and  said  good-by  to  honor  and  my  word  to  dad. 
It  's — it  's  from  that  that  you  have  saved  me." 

Helene  waved  her  hand  deprecatingly. 

"I  did  little  enough  for  you,  Lew.  Not  half  what 
I  would  willingly  have  done.  But — but  your  dad — I 
wrote  you  I  'd  seen  him  just  for  an  hour  at  Port  Said. 
Your  dad,  Lew,  he  's  given  you  all  he  had." 

"What  do  you  mean?"  asked  Lewis,  troubled. 

"Nothing,"  said  Helene,  her  thoughts  wandering; 
"nothing  that  telling  will  show  you."  She  turned  back 
to  him  and  smiled.  "Let 's  talk  about  your  pal  Natalie. 
We  're  great  friends." 

"Friends  ?"  said  Lewis.  "Have  you  been  writing  to 
her?" 

"Oh,  no,"  said  Helene.  "Women  do  n't  have  to  know 
each  other  to  be  friends." 

"Why.  there  's  nothing  more  to  tell  about  Natalie," 
said  Lewis. 

Helene  looked  him  squarely  in  the  eyes. 

"Tell  me  honestly,"  she  said;  "have  n't  you  wanted 
to  go  back  to  Natalie?" 


346     THKOUGH    STAINED   GLASS 

Lewis  flushed.  He  rose  and  picked  up  his  hat  and 
stick. 

"  'You  can  give  a  new  hat  to  a  king,  but  it  is  n't 
everybody  that  will  take  your  cast-off  clothes.'  That  's 
one  of  dad's,  of  course." 


CHAPTER   LH 

THROUGH  that  winter  Lewis  worked  steadily  for- 
ward to  a  goal  that  he  knew  his  father  could  not 
cavil  at.  He  knew  it  instinctively.  His  grasp  steadied 
to  expression  with  repression,  or,  as  one  of  his  envious, 
but  honest,  competitors  put  it,  genius  had  bowed  to 
sanity. 

It  is  usual  to  credit  these  rebirths  in  individual  art 
to  some  great  grief,  but  no  great  grief  had  come  to 
Lewis.  His  work  fulfilled  its  promise  in  just  such 
measure  as  he  had  fulfilled  himself.  In  as  much  as 
he  had  matured,  in  so  much  had  his  art.  Man  is  not 
ripened  by  a  shock,  but  by  those  elements  that  develop 
him  to  the  point  of  feeling  and  knowing  the  shock  when 
it  comes  to  him.  In  a  drab  world,  drab  would  have 
been  Lewis's  end ;  but,  little  as  he  realized  it,  his  world 
had  not  been  drab. 

Three  steady,  but  varying,  lights  had  shone  upon 
him.  The  influence  of  Natalie,  as  soft  and  still  as  re- 
flected light;  of  Helene,  worldly  before  the  world,  but 
big  of  heart;  and  of  Leighton,  who  had  been  judged 
in  all  things  that  he  might  judge,  had  drawn  Lewis  up 
above  his  self-chosen  level,  given  sight  to  his  eyes,  and 

347 


348     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

reduced  Folly  to  the  proportions  of  a  little  final  period 
to  the  paragraph  of  irresponsible  youth. 

To  maturity  Lewis  had  added  a  gravity  that  had 
come  to  him  with  the  realization  that  in  distancing  him- 
self from  youth  he  had  also  unwittingly  drawn  away 
from  the  hearts  that  had  done  most  toward  bringing 
him  emancipation.  He  had  no  psychological  turn  of 
mind.  He  could  not  penetrate  the  sudden  reserve  that 
had  fallen  upon  his  father  or  the  apparent  increasing 
distraction  with  which  Helene  met  his  visits.  He  did 
not  know  that  it  is  in  youth  and  in  age  that  hearts 
attain  their  closest  contact  and  that  the  soul  that  finds 
itself,  generally  does  so  in  solitude. 

He  was  hurt  by  the  long  silence  of  his  father — a 
silence  unbroken  now  in  months,  and  by  Helene's  with- 
drawal, which  was  marked  enough  to  make  him  pro- 
long the  intervals  between  his  visits  to  her,  and  baffled 
him  on  those  rare  occasions  when  they  met. 

His  life  became  somber  and,  as  lightning  comes  only 
to  clouds,  so  to  his  clouded  skies  came  the  flash  and  the 
blow  of  a  letter  from  Africa.  It  was  not  from  his 
father,  but  from  Old  Ivory.  He  found  it  on  the  break- 
fast table  and  started  to  open  it,  but  some  premonition 
arrested  him.  He  laid  it  aside,  tried  to  finish  his  meal, 
and  failed.  A  thickness  in  his  throat  would  not  let  him 
eat.  He  left  the  table  and  went  into  the  living-room, 
closing  the  door  behind  him. 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    349 

He  opened  the  letter  and  read  the  first  few  words, 
then  he  sat  and  stared  for  many  a  long  minute  into 
the  fire,  the  half-crumpled  sheets  held  tightly  in  his 
hand. 

Nelton  opened  the  door. 

"Excuse  me,  sir,"  he  said;  "you  have  an  engage- 
ment at  ten." 

"Break  it  by  telephone,"  said  Lewis.  "Do  n't  come 
in  again  unless  I  ring.  I  'm  out  if  anybody  calls." 

When  Helton  had  closed  the  door,  Lewis  spread  the 
letter  on  his  knee  and  read : 

DEAR  LEW: 

All  is  well  with  your  dad  at  last.  I'm  a  poor  hand  to 
talk  and  a  poorer  to  write,  for  my  finger  is  crooked  to  hold 
a  trigger,  not  a  pen.  But  he  gave  me  it  to  do.  Do  n't  take 
it  too  hard  that  a  man  with  only  plain  words  is  blunt.  Your 
father  is  gone. 

I  do  n't  have  to  tell  you  that  in  the  last  few  weeks  before 
he  left  you  your  dad  grew  old.  He's  grown  old  before,  but 
never  as  old  as  that.  The  other  times,  the  mere  sight  and 
smell  of  Africa  started  his  blood  again.  But  this  time  he 
stayed  old — until  to-day. 

To-day  we  were  out  after  elephant,  and  your  dad  had 
won  the  toss  for  first  shot.  We  had  n't  gone  a  mile  from 
camp  when  a  lone  bull  buffalo  crossed  the  trail,  and  your 
dad  tried  for  him — a  long,  quick  shot.  The  bullet  only 
plowed  his  rump.  The  bull  charged  up  the  wind  straight 
for  us,  and  before  the  thunder  of  him  got  near  enough  to 
drown  a  shout,  your  dad  yelled  out  "He's  mine,  Ive!  He's 
mine!" 

I  held  my  fire,  God  help  me;  so  did  your  dad — held  it  till 
the  bull  had  passed  the  death-line.  You  know  with  charg- 


350     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

ing  buffalo  there's  more  to  stop  than  just  life.  There's 
weight  and  momentum  and  there's  a  rage  that  no  other,  man 
or  beast,  can  equal. 

Your  dad  got  him — got  him  with  the  perfect  shot, — but 
not  before  the  bull  had  passed  the  death-line.  And  so,  dear 
boy,  they  broke  even,  a  life  for  a  life.  And  your  dad  was 
glad.  With  the  bones  of  his  body  crushed  to  a  pulp,  he 
could  smile  as  I  've  never  seen  him  smile  before.  He  pulled 
me  down  close  to  him  and  he  said:  "Bury  me  here — right 
here,  Ive,  and  tell  my  boy  I  stopped  to  take  on  a  side-tracked 
car.  That  's  a  part  of  our  language.  He  '11  understand." 


Lewis's  eyes  went  blind  over  his  father's  words,  his 
father's  message.  "Tell  my  boy  I  stopped  to  take  on 
a  side-tracked  car."  Half  across  the  world  those  words 
carried  him  back  and  back  over  half  of  life  to  a  rattling 
train,  a  boy,  and  the  wondrous  stranger,  speaking: 
"Every  man  who  goes  through  the  stress  of  life  has 
need  of  an  individual  philosophy  .  .  .  Life  to  me  is 
like  this  train ;  a  lot  of  sections  and  a  lot  of  couplings 
.  .  .  Once  in  a  while  your  soul  looks  out  of  the  win- 
dow and  sees  some  long-forgotten,  side-tracked  car  beck- 
oning to  be  coupled  on  again.  If  you  try  to  go  back 
and  pick  it  up,  you  're  done." 

Not  in  Africa  had  his  father  stopped  to  take  on  a 
side-tracked  car,  but  on  a  day  that  was  already  months 
ago  when,  standing  in  a  still,  deserted  lane,  he  turned 
to  face  forever  that  moment  of  his  life  that  had  nearest 
touched  divinity. 

Lewis  sat  pondering  for  hours.     It  was  not  grief  he 


THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS     351 

was  feeling  so  much  as  an  immeasurable  loss.  One 
grieves  at  death  when  it  seems  futile,  when  it  robs 
youth  or  racks  old  age,  when  it  devastates  hopes  or 
wrecks  a  vision.  But  death  had  not  come  so  to  his 
father.  It  had  come  as  a  fulfilment.  Lewis  knew  in- 
stinctively that  thus  and  thus  only  would  his  father 
have  wished  to  strike  into  the  royal  road. 

But  the  loss  seized  upon  his  heart  and  made  it  ache. 
Be  thought  despondently,  as  which  one  of  us  has  not, 
face  to  face  with  the  fact  of  death,  of  things  undone 
and  of  words  unsaid.  How  cruel  seemed  their  last  hur- 
ried farewell,  how  hard  that  his  father  could  not  have 
known  that  his  sacrifice  had  told  for  his  boy's  liberty, 
that  his  wisdom  had  rightly  seen  the  path  his  art  must 
follow  to  its  land  of  promise !  "Hard  for  you — only  for 
you,"  whispered  the  voice  of  his  new-found  maturity. 

It  was  natural  that  with  reaction  should  come  to 
Lewis  a  desire  to  talk,  to  seek  comfort  and  sympathy, 
and  it  was  natural  that  he  should  turn  to  Helene.  He 
walked  slowly  to  her  house.  The  doorman  turned  from 
him  to  pick  up  a  note  from  the  hall  table.  He  handed 
it  to  Lewis. 

"Her  ladyship  is  not  in,  sir,  to-day.  Her  ladyship 
told  me  to  give  you  the  note  when  you  called." 

Lewis  took  the  note  and  walked  out.  He  opened  it 
absently  and  read: 


352     THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS 

Lew  darling,  I  have  heard.  They  will  tell  you  that  I  am 
out.  I'm  not  out,  but  I  am  broken.  I  cannot  let  you  see 
me.  Dear,  I  have  given  you  all  that  I  had  to  give. 

He  stood  stock-still  and  read  the  words  again,  then 
he  raised  his  eyes  and  looked  slowly  about  him.  Street, 
faces,  trees,  walls,  and  towers  faded  from  his  view.  He 
stood  in  the  midst  of  an  illimitable  void.  A  terror  of 
loneliness  fell  upon  him.  He  felt  as  though  his  full 
heart  must  speak  or  break,  but  in  all  his  present  world 
there  was  no  ear  to  hear.  Suddenly  the  impulse  of  a 
lifetime,  often  felt,  seldom  answered,  came  to  him  with 
an  insistence  that  would  not  be  denied.  Go  to  Natalie. 
Tell  Natalie. 


CHAPTER   LIII 

SPRING  was  in  the  very  act  of  birth  when  Lewis 
found  himself  once  more  in  the  old  carryall 
threading  the  River  Road.  This  time  he  sat  beside  Old 
William,  and  the  horses  plodded  along  slowly,  tamed 
by  the  slack  reins  lying  neglected  on  their  backs.  Old 
William  was  not  driving.  His  hands,  loosely  holding 
the  lines,  lay  on  his  knees.  Down  his  pink  cheeks  and 
into  his  white  beard  crawled  tears  from  his  wide  blue 
eyes. 

"Glen  dead!  Little  Glen  Leighton  dead!"  he  said 
aloud  from  time  to  time,  and  Lewis  knew  himself  for- 
gotten. He  forgave  the  old  man  for  the  sake  of  the 
picture  he  conjured — a  picture  of  that  other  boyhood 
when  "little  Glen  Leighton"  and  the  wood-cutter  had 
hunted  and  fished  and  roamed  these  crowding  hills  to- 
gether. 

The  next  day  was  one  of  pouring  showers.  Twice 
Lewis  left  the  house,  only  to  be  turned  back  by  the 
rain.  He  was  not  afraid  of  getting  wet,  but  he  was 
afraid  of  having  to  talk  to  Natalie  indoors.  He  could 
not  remember  ever  having  talked  to  her  hemmed  in  by 
four  walls. 

353 


354     THKOUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

But  on  the  morrow  he  awoke  to  clean-washed  skies 
and  a  fuzzy  pale-green  carpet  that  spread  across  the 
fields  and  rose  in  bumps  and  mounds  over  trees  and 
budding  shrubs.  He  left  the  homestead  early,  and 
struck  out  for  Aunt  Jed's.  As  he  approached  the  house, 
a  strange  diffidence  fell  upon  him.  Hie  was  afraid  to 
go  in.  For  an  hour  he  sat  on  the  top  rail  of  a  fence 
and  watched. 

At  last  Natalie  came  out.  She  started  to  walk  to- 
ward him,  but  presently  turned  to  the  right.  Lewis 
followed  her.  At  first  she  walked  fast,  but  soon  she 
began  to  pause  beside  some  burst  of  green  or  tempting 
downy  mass  of  pussy-willow,  as  though  she  were  in  two 
minds  whether  to  fill  her  arms  and  rush  back,  carrying 
spring  into  the  house  or  to  go  on.  She  went  on  slowly 
until  she  reached  the  barrier  of  rails  that  closed  the 
entrance  to  Leighton's  land  of  dreams.  Here  Lewis 
came  up  with  her. 

"Nat,"  he  said,  "shall  I  help  you  over?" 

Natalie  whirled  round  at  the  sound  of  his  voice.  Just 
for  a  second  there  was  fright  in  her  eyes;  then  color 
mounted  swiftly  into  her  pale  cheeks,  and  her  lips 
opened  to  speak,  but  she  said  nothing.  There  was  some- 
thing in  Lewis's  face  that  stopped  her — a  look  of  age 
and  of  hunger.  She  wanted  to  ask  him  why  he  had 
come  back,  but  her  heart  was  beating  so  fast  that  she 
dared  not  trust  her  voice. 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS     355 

Lewis  was  frightened,  too.  He  was  frightened  lest 
he  should  find  the  strange  woman  when  he  needed  just 
the  oldest  pal  he  had  in  the  world. 

"Nat,"  he  blurted  out,  "dad  is  dead." 

When  a  man  thinks  he  is  being  clumsy  and  tactless 
with  a  woman,  he  is  generally  making  a  master  stroke. 
At  Lewis's  words,  so  simple,  so  child-like,  the  con- 
scious flush  died  from  Natalie's  cheeks,  her  heart 
steadied  down,  and  her  eyes  filled  with  the  sudden  tears 
of  sympathy. 

"Dead,  Lew?    Your  dad  dead?" 

She  put  her  arms  around  him  and  kissed  him  softly ; 
then  she  drew  him  to  a  low  rock.  They  sat  down  side 
by  side. 

"Tell  Natalie,"  she  said. 

Lewis  could  never  remember  that  hour  with  Natalie 
except  as  a  whole.  Between  the  bursting  of  a  dam  and 
the  moment  when  the  pent-up  waters  stretch  to  their 
utmost  level  and  peace  there  is  no  division  of  time.  He 
knew  only  that  it  was  like  that  with  him.  He  had  come 
in  oppression,  he  had  found  peace. 

Then  he  looked  up  into  Natalie's  speaking  face  and 
knew  that  he  had  found  more.  He  had  found  again  his 
old  pal.  "A  pal  is  one  who  can't  do  wrong  who  can't 
go  wrong,  who  can't  grow  wrong."  Who  had  said  that  ? 
Helene — Helene,  who,  never  having  seen  Natalie  save 
with  the  inner  vision,  knew  her  for  a  friend.  To  Folly 


356     THKOTJGH    STAINED    GLASS 

his  body  had  cried,  "Let  us  stay  young  together !"  To 
Natalie  his  Hood,  his  body,  and  his  soul  were  ready 
to  cry  out,  "Let  us  grow  old  together!" 

Natalie  had  not  followed  the  turn  of  his  emotion. 
She  broke  in  upon  his  thought  and  brought  him  back. 

"I  never  talked  to  your  dad,  but — we  knew  each 
other,  we  liked  each  other." 

Lewis  started. 

"That  's  funny,"  he  said. 

"Is  it?"  said  Natalie.  "I  suppose  it  sounds  odd, 
but " 

"No,"  interrupted  Lewis,  "that  's  not  what  I  mean. 
It 's  odd  because  Helene  said  just  the  same  thing  about 
you.  She  said  you  were  great  friends — that  women 
did  n't  have  to  know  each  other  to  be  friends." 

"They  do  n't  have  to  know  men  to  be  friends,  either," 
said  Natalie,  "unless " 

"Unless  what?" 

"Unless  they  love  them.  If  they  love  them,  they  've 
got  to  know  them  through  and  through  to  be  friends. 
Love  twists  a  woman's  vision.  Lots  of  women  are  ruined 
because  they  can't  wait  to  see  through  and  through." 

"Why,  Nat,"  said  Lewis,  "you  're  talking  like  dad. 
Dad  never  talks — talked — without  turning  on  the  light." 

"Does  n't  he  ?"  said  Natalie. 

Lewis  nodded. 

"There  are  people  that  think  of  dad  as  a  bad  man. 


THKOUGH   STAINED    GLASS    357 

He  has  told  me  so.  But  he  was  n't  bad  to  me  or  to 
Helene  or  Nelton  or  Old  William,  and  we  're  the  ones 
that  knew  him  best." 

For  a  time  they  were  silent,  then  Natalie  said: 
"Lew,  you  're  older  than  you  ever  were  before.  Is  it 
just  losing  your  dad  ?" 

Lewis  shook  his  head. 

"No,"  he  said,  "it  was  n't  that.  I  finished  growing 
up  just  after  I  got  back  to  London.  I  'm  not  the  only 
thing  that  has  grown.  My  work — sometime  I  '11  show 
you  my  work  before  and  after.  I  wish  I  could  have 
shown  it  to  dad, — I  wish  I  could  have  told  him  that  I  've 
said  good-by  to  Folly." 

"Good-by  to  Folly?"  cried  Natalie,  with  a  leap  of 
the  heart.  Then  her  heart  sank  back.  "You  mean 
you  Ve  said  good-by  to  foolishness,  to  childish  things  ?" 

"Both,"  said  Lewis.  "Folly  Delaires  and-  childish 
things." 

"Why  ?"  asked  Natalie,  shortly. 

"Because,"  said  Lewis,  "it  was  given  me  to  see  her 
through  and  through." 

"And  now  ?"  breathed  Natalie,  drawing  slightly  away 
from  him  lest  he  hear  the  thumping  of  her  heart. 

Lewis  turned  his  head  and  looked  at  her.  The  flush 
was  back  in  her  cheeks,  her  eyes  were  wide  and  staring 
far  away,  her  moist  lips  were  half  open,  and  her  bosom 


358     THROUGH    STAINED    GLASS 

rose  and  fell  in  the  long,  halting  swell  of  tremulous 
breath. 

There  is  a  beauty  that  transcends  the  fixed  bounds 
of  flesh,  that  leaps  to  the  eye  of  love  when  all  the  world 
is  blind.  The  flower  that  opens  slowly,  the  face  grown 
dear  through  half  of  life,  needs  no  tenure  in  memory. 
It  lives.  Years  can  not  dim  its  beauty  nor  age  destroy 
its  grace,  for  the  vision  is  part  of  him  who  sees. 

The  vision  came  to  Lewis.  His  arms  trembled  to 
grip  Natalie,  to  outrage  her  trust,  and  seize  too  lightly 
the  promise  of  the  years. 

"Now,  Nat  ?"  he  said  hoarsely.  He  raised  his  hands 
slowly,  took  off  her  hat,  and  tossed  it  aside.  Then  with 
trembling  fingers  he  let  down  her  hair.  It  tumbled 
about  her  shoulders  in  a  gold  and  copper  glory  of  light 
and  shade.  Natalie  did  not  stir.  Lewis  caught  up  a 
handful  of  her  hair  and  held  it  against  his  cheek. 
"Now,"  he  said,  "I  stay  here.  Since  long  before  the 
day  you  said  that  you  and  I  would  sail  together  to  the 
biggest  island  you  've  held  my  hand,  and  I  've  held 
yours.  Sometimes  I  've  forgotten,  but — but  I  've  never 
really  let  go.  I  '11  not  let  go  now.  I  '11  cling  to  you, 
walk  beside  you,  live  with  you,  hand  in  hand,  until  the 
day  you  know  me  through  and  through. 

"And  then  ?"  whispered  Natalie. 

"Then  I  '11  love  you,"  said  Lewis,  gravely.    "For  me 


THEOUGH    STAINED    GLASS    359 

you  hold  all  the  seven  worlds  of  women.    I  've — I  've 
been  walking  with  my  back  to  the  light. 

Natalie  laughed  —  the  soft  laughter  with  which 
women  choke  back  tears.  She  put  up  her  hands  and 
drew  Lewis's  head  against  her  breast. 


THE     END 


A    000  051  850    6 


